


In Loco Parentis

by SenEolas



Series: Group Chats of the Ulster Cycle [1]
Category: Irish Mythology, Táin Bó Cúailnge, Ulster Cycle
Genre: Academia, Ballet, Canon What Canon, College AU, Gen, Height difference, M/M, Modern AU, Pas de deux, aka ferdia is tall and cú chulainn is tiny and it's cute, because I do and this is what I do with it, cú chulainn is a bisexual disaster, emer is a terrifying getaway driver, everyone mumfriends cú chulainn, group chats of the ulster cycle, i am utterly inconsistent in whether i use the medieval or modern forms of anyone's name, lug and súaltaim are cú chulainn's gay dads, láeg and cú chulainn are flatmates, naoise is fine he's got WiFi, occasional crime, occasional smatterings of angst, the car is not a stand-in for a cow that parallel is a coincidence, they're just stealing a car, trans cú chulainn, ulaid family drama, which is to say they steal a car, would you believe I have a degree in medieval Irish, you're just gonna have to live with that
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-29
Updated: 2019-08-29
Packaged: 2019-09-30 02:48:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 23
Words: 50,339
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17215583
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SenEolas/pseuds/SenEolas
Summary: Láeg is hoping for a quiet year in which he can obtain his Master's, a job offer, and a sense of purpose, with the absolute minimum of drama. What he's got is a seventeen-year-old undergrad as a flatmate, and life around Cú Chulainn is anything but quiet or drama-free...Literally just a ridiculous college AU in which Láeg and Cú Chulainn are flatmates. Occasional smatterings of angst, but mostly fluff; nobody's *dead* so we're automatically doing better than the source material. Featuring ballet, group chats, procrastibaking, crime, and general shenanigans, but anything resembling a plot is coincidental. Absolutely no planning or editing went into the creation of this fic, and that's the way I like it; you've been warned.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Dedicated to the denizens of The Muddle Ages discord server, since they're the only people who will get half the jokes anyway.
> 
> No betas, we post first drafts like men. But many thanks to those of you who comment regularly (or even occasionally): I love you. <3
> 
> You can find me on Tumblr as trans-cuchulainn, and I also run incorrect-ulster-cycle for more Irish mythology-related silliness and shenanigans. I'm @seneolas on Twitter; come and say hi!
> 
> NB: the university depicted in this fic is fictional, and roughly follows the UK system/setup, mostly because I was too lazy to do research into how the Irish system works for a fic that started as a joke. It's probably somewhere in Northern Ireland, on account of it being the Ulster Cycle we're talking about and there being little demand for universities for sheep. (Sorry, Donegal.)

When they told Láeg his new flatmate would be a fresher, his first instinct was resignation.

It was inevitable, wasn’t it? After his other flatmates proved themselves completely unreliable, he needed _someone._ One of them vanished after relationship drama – everyone assumed he’d come back, but nobody had heard from him or his girlfriend, so it looked like that wasn’t the case. One transferred to another university after a dispute with his supervisor; Láeg had done his best to stay out of it, given that the supervisor in question was his third potential flatmate's father, but it sounded like shit had gone down. The drama had got bad enough for potential flatmate #3 to suspend his studies while he figured out whether to transfer or not, leaving Láeg the sole member of their friendship group still currently in academia. It was hard not to feel a little betrayed.

So. Three spare rooms. Of course the university would put someone in one of them. What was more remarkable was that the other two were empty – which didn’t bother Láeg, since he was only paying rent for his room. Likely enough they’d stick another post-grad in halfway through the year, someone whose course started in February or something.

But in the third room… an undergrad. More than that – a _fresher_. He guessed he was lucky they’d only lumbered him with one, and not three. That probably would have spelled disaster for his Master's.

He’d resigned himself to the whole thing, though, with as much good humour as he could muster – and then they dropped the second bombshell. Not only was the kid in his first year, but he’d skipped a couple of years of school somewhere, meaning he’d be barely seventeen at the start of term.

 _While his safety is not, of course, your responsibility,_ they’d written, _we nevertheless trust that as a responsible adult you will do your best to ease his transition into university life, and will behave in an appropriate manner._

The fucking gall. An ‘appropriate manner’ – what was that supposed to mean? No drinking or wild parties? Neither were high on Láeg’s list of priorities, but a university interdict against them for the sake of his baby flatmate might make him think differently out of sheer spite. He hadn’t _asked_ to babysit a child prodigy. Were they going to make him get a DBS check next? Send round CPS the first time the kid complained about him?

Fuck this for a game of administrative bullshit – he had half a mind to pull out of uni accommodation and go private, but this was cheaper, and about ten minutes closer to campus, and you couldn’t beat on-call maintenance when the plumbing gave up.

Maybe, he thought, clinging to his dreams of academic success, maybe the fresher would be the quiet studious type who sat in his room all day, and they’d only ever interact in the kitchen or on the way to the bathroom. Maybe he’d even have a girlfriend, and would spend all his time at her place, though how many girls would date a seventeen-year-old fresher, he wasn’t sure. He could live in hope, though, right?

Láeg took one look at his to-do list and resigned himself to a year of exile in the library.

* * *

Seventeen, they’d told him, but the kid looked younger than that. Láeg stayed out of the way while his new flatmate moved in – with the help of someone Láeg presumed was his father – but although he tried to keep himself sequestered in his room, eventually he had to emerge to get a snack. He made it to the kitchen without encountering the new arrivals, but the foibles of his temperamental toaster were his undoing: he’d managed nothing so much as slightly warm bread when the boy appeared.

He was _tiny._ Didn’t look more than fourteen, if Láeg was being honest about it. Maybe being a child prodigy stunted your growth. Maybe he’d lied about his age.

_Please let him not have lied about his age._

“I’m Láeg,” he heard himself say. Apparently the instinct towards politeness took over when the rest of his brain was elsewhere.

The boy regarded him. “Cú Chulainn,” he said. “Is it just us?”

“For now. The other two rooms are empty.” The toaster popped, and he examined the bread again. Still not really what you’d call toast. He slotted it back into the toaster and turned up the dial.

“Hard luck,” said Cú Chulainn. “That they dumped me on you, I mean. You’re not a fresher, are you?”

“Postgrad, for my sins.” Was it doing _anything_? Maybe he needed a new toaster. Maybe the boy would’ve brought one, in all the mountains of luggage he seemed to have. Freshers were usually overenthusiastic with the kitchen equipment, weren’t they?

His new flatmate laughed. “Should’ve known. You’ve got the dead-eyed academia look.”

Láeg looked away from the toaster to raise his eyebrow at the boy. “Wow, thanks. And you’ve got the look of someone who isn’t old enough to be living without parental supervision.”

“I’m seventeen.”

“Like I said. I’m not going to be your father figure while you’re here, you know that?”

“Thank god,” he said. “I’ve got enough fathers already.”

“Don’t let your dad hear you say that,” said a voice from the doorway. Láeg glanced round, trying to hide his momentary confusion. He’d _assumed_ the man was Cú Chulainn’s father, but maybe not. “Súaltaim,” the man said, coming forward and holding out his hand. “Nice to meet you.”

Láeg shook it. “Láeg.”

“On behalf of my son, I apologise for whatever he puts you through this year. Did I hear you say you’re a postgrad?”

 “Doing my Master's,” said Láeg, a little dazed as he tried to keep track. A smell of burning had begun to emanate from the toaster. “So if he’s your son, then…”

“My husband wanted to help him move in too, but he had to work this weekend. Which is a shame, because he’s much better at this kind of thing than I am.” Oh, right. Obviously that was what he’d meant about the fathers – Láeg felt stupid for not realising. Way to blind himself with heteronormativity. “So what’s your Master's on?”

The toast popped up again, burned to cinders. Because of course it was. Láeg took it over to the sink and started scraping off the worst of the blackness as he described his research to Súaltaim. It was easier if he didn’t have to make eye contact while fending off the usual questions about career plans – and he wasn’t about to stick around long enough to start again with the toast. He couldn’t shake the feeling that Súaltaim was testing him, trying to work out if he was a responsible enough adult to leave in charge of his son.

Which was stupid, because Láeg was absolutely not in charge of this – this _child_ they’d dumped on him. He was barely responsible for himself. He couldn’t even make toast, for fuck’s sake, though with the blackness scraped off and a generous helping of butter it was beginning to resemble food.

“I – I’ll leave you to unpack,” he said, and made good his escape before they could protest. He was already in his room with the door closed when he realised he’d left his toast in the kitchen. Well, there went that. He wasn’t going back for it now.

Out in the corridor he could hear intermittent crashing sounds as they unpacked what sounded like an IKEA’s worth of crockery. There was a loud thump, followed by a series of inventive swear words (from Cú Chulainn), a reprimand (from Súaltaim), and a peal of laughter (unclear, but given the high pitch, probably the boy).

Láeg reached for his headphones.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Láeg is tired, Cú Chulainn is trans, Cormac is there for some reason, what is plot

Láeg couldn’t avoid his flatmate forever, but he wanted it to be known that he made a valiant effort to do so. For two days they barely spoke, exchanging the minimum of words in the corridor – and not for lack of trying on the boy’s part, either, since he seemed determined to keep Láeg in the loop about everything happening in his life. On the third day he had a few hours of blessed silence while the freshers’ fair was going on – right over the other side of campus, and with absolutely nothing to interest Láeg or demand his attention – before Cú Chulainn returned, brandishing leaflets, right as Láeg was cooking and therefore unable to leave the kitchen unless he wanted to abandon his omelette.

He did not want to abandon his omelette.

This made him more or less a captive audience, and his flatmate took full advantage of this, inflicting upon him a largely meaningless monologue about everyone he’d spoken to in the last two days (none of whom Láeg knew, leaving him with zero points of reference to actually make sense of the torrent of words).

Finally, a phrase snagged his interest. “…and that’s how I ended up joining the dance society,” said Cú Chulainn. He was blushing a little, and Láeg dragged himself out of his inattentive state to acknowledge that if he’d been listening, he would know why that was.

“Say that part again?” he said.

“Were you listening to a word I said?”

“Here and there. Why did you say you joined the dance society?”

Cú Chulainn scowled. “There was this girl, and she—”

“Ah,” interrupted Láeg, already losing interest in the details except as something to tease him about. “Say no more.”

“No, not like that,” he protested. “She – she basically dared me to do it. It’s complicated.”

And because his flatmate was seventeen and probably some kind of socially backwards child genius, a dare was enough to make him do it. Láeg sighed. “You know you don’t have to go to everything you signed up for in fresher’s week, right? They all want you on their mailing lists, but, like, five percent of people actually turn up. No one will notice if you don’t go.”

“Oh, trust me,” said the boy darkly, “she’ll know. Besides,” he added, “it’s not that I don’t want to. I’ve danced before. I actually did ballet competitively for several years.”

Láeg eyed him. He didn’t look muscular enough to be a dancer. “Well, in that case, what’s the problem?”

“She made me sign up for pas de deux.” Cú Chulainn threw up his hands in despair. “She said there weren’t enough boys! How can I tell her that I’ve only ever danced the women’s roles? I can’t _lift_ anyone. I’ve only ever been the one being lifted! I’m gonna get there and they’re gonna foist some poor girl on me and it’s going to be a _disaster_!”

“You danced the women’s roles?” Láeg asked, amused despite himself.

“Well, yeah, I wasn’t out at that point.”

And once again he’d put his foot in it. “Oh, shit, I didn’t…”

“Well, I guess that means I’m passing.” Cú Chulainn raised an eyebrow. “They didn’t tell you I was trans?”

“Why would they? They didn’t tell me anything about you other than the fact that you were seventeen. I don’t even know what subject you’re studying.”

“Theology,” he said offhand, as though this wasn’t the most completely bizarre answer he could give. “I thought they’d have told you. My dads were pretty insistent that they should vet anyone I’d be living with for, like, notorious transphobia, and I don’t know how they’d have done that without asking you your opinions to see whether or not you’re a raging bigot.”

His tone was still light, but there was tension in his shoulders that hadn’t been there before. It wasn’t like he’d seen enough of Láeg in the next few days to know whether or not he had anything to worry about – for which Láeg slightly hated himself.

“I guess they thought that as former treasurer of the LGBT society, I was a safe bet,” he said, then added, “Though they shouldn’t, really. Transphobia in the gay community is still a major issue, however much we’d like to think it isn’t.”

Cú Chulainn’s shoulders relaxed ever so slightly. “Right.”

“Sorry if it seemed like I was mocking you for the women’s roles thing,” he added. “That would’ve been shitty of me even if you were cis. Gender is bullshit anyway.”

His flatmate’s mouth quirked into a smile. “Amen, brother. So you’re… gay, then?”

“Probably,” said Láeg, with a shrug.

“Probably?” echoed Cú Chulainn.

“Well, fuck if I know at this point, to be honest. I like who I like. It isn’t many people and it isn’t very often, and though most of them have been dudes, I wouldn’t say there’s been conclusive evidence to prove any sort of label is definitely the right one.” He gave up trying to label it shortly after he came to university, and it was a huge relief to know he didn’t have to squeeze into any particular box. “And you?”

“Pretty sure I’m bi, but…” He spread his hands vaguely, a non-committal gesture. “Who can really be sure about any of that kind of stuff?”

“Amen, brother,” Láeg said, and the boy grinned.

“I like you, Láeg,” he said. “Can I keep you? Is that allowed?”

“Well, if you don’t want to, you can be the one to move out. I lived here first.” He finished the last few bites of his omelette and got up to dump his plate in the sink, along with the greasy frying pain. Those would need washing up. If he’d been alone here, he’d have just left it until later, but if he didn’t do his washing up, he couldn’t complain when his flatmate inevitably didn’t do his, and if there was anything Láeg wanted to be able to do, it’s to justifiably complain about things. “So, these pas de deux classes of yours. You think they’ll be relentlessly heterosexual?”

“No idea,” said Cú Chulainn. “But I guess I’ll find out, won’t I? First class is Tuesday. Apparently the teacher’s some mad Scottish woman and no one can understand half of what she says, so it sounds great on that front alone. And hey, it’ll get me out of your hair for an evening.”

Well, Láeg wasn’t going to say it…

* * *

“Heard you got stuck with a fresher,” said Cormac, pushing a pint across the table towards Láeg. The pub was more or less empty – all the new undergrads had found livelier places to get trashed, and this one was tucked away around the back of the old labs, so tended only to be frequented by the postgrads who’d been there long enough to know it wasn’t worth walking into town and paying the higher prices just for a view that wasn’t of a building site. They’d discovered it in Láeg’s final year of undergrad, while Cormac was finishing his Master’s, and since neither of them had managed to leave yet, the habit had stuck.

“Yeah, well,” said Láeg, “I _asked_ if you wanted to live with me.”

“Sorry,” said Cormac. He didn’t look sorry. “Fergus needed me. I didn’t think I could commit.”

“And now?” With Fergus halfway across the country, there was no real reason why Cormac shouldn’t return to finish his PhD now, instead of taking the whole year out. “Are you coming back?”

“Not sure.” How many times had they met here? Too many. It had become a kind of ritual, week in, week out. Even that first year when they lived off campus, they’d still ended up coming back here to drink, which led to some truly awful bus rides back home late at night, when Láeg was too drunk to drive. “Got a few things to figure out. I don’t know if the department here is really the place for me. Because, y'know, maybe I'd be better off studying somewhere my dad isn't faculty, even if he's not in my department.”

"I thought you guys were getting on better these days." _Since Fergus left,_ Láeg wanted to add, but didn't.

"We are," said Cormac. "I just... maybe need a bit of space to figure my shit out without having him looking over my shoulder. But of course he'll take it personally if I transfer, which is one of the reasons I'm in this kind of... limbo. Easier to be nowhere, at this point."

Láeg looked glumly down at his pint. He’d expected that kind of answer, but it still sucks to envisage the whole year without any of his friends around to commiserate with him. “Academia mourns the loss of you," he said, trying to hide his disappointment.

"Please. It doesn't need me when it's got you. You can just admit you miss me, you know that?"

"Miss you?" said Láeg. "I get more done in a day than I used to manage in a week when you and Fergus were here to distract me." But then he relented: "If you change your mind, we’ve still got two spare rooms.”

“Live with you and the fresher?”

“He’s not so bad,” he said, his defensive tone surprising them both. Cormac raised his eyebrow, and he tried to explain: “Sure, he’s seventeen, and he talks too much, but also he’s this tiny trans kid who told me he used to do competitive ballet while he was closeted.”

“Ah, so they gave you a gayby. Well, that’s something.”

“He’s bi, actually, but yeah.” The only thing worse than a seventeen-year-old flatmate would’ve been a cishet seventeen-year-old flatmate. “I don’t know, Cormac, I feel kind of… protective.”

“Well, shit,” said Cormac, sounding half concerned and half impressed. Láeg suspected he might already be a little tipsy. “Looks like you have parental instincts after all.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Heard your alarm go off,” he said, for want of anything better. “Er. Wondered if you wanted a cup of tea.”  
> There was a muffled sound that might have been somebody with a duvet over their face telling somebody else to go away.

One of the positives of this living arrangement was that Láeg wasn’t in the bedroom adjoining Cú Chulainn’s. The flat consisted of a windowless corridor with five doors opening off it: the four bedrooms arranged two on either side, and the kitchen/living space at the end. The first room on the right was empty; the second was Láeg’s. The second room on the left was empty; the first was Cú Chulainn’s. In other words, they were separated by several walls and an ugly carpet that looked as though its designer had given up on life five minutes before putting together the insipid collection of dots that constituted its pattern.

And yet despite this expanse of uninspiring interior design and a few thick layers of plaster and paint, Láeg still heard all too clearly the shrill sound of Cú Chulainn’s alarm clock, and the sound of something solid hitting a wall and shattering.

He got out of bed.

He’d been resisting this for about forty minutes, although his own phone had buzzed at him with half a dozen reminders not to fall asleep again, because he was supposed to be meeting with his supervisor at ten and he needed to be awake enough to talk through the chaos that was his work at the moment. The lure of his bed was too strong – it seemed to have teamed up with gravity to keep him trapped, shackled to it by a tangle of blankets and warmth.

But that shattering sound didn’t sound like good news, and his immediate concern for the state of the wall overcame his inertia and had him upright in moments, reaching for his dressing gown.

Gingerly, Láeg opened his door and peered out into the corridor. The wall – this side of it, at least – appeared still to be intact, which suggested that plaster had vanquished plastic in this particular battle. That was always assuming it _was_ the alarm clock that his flatmate had thrown, and not something more dangerous and/or valuable. He took a few more steps, listening. There was a strange buzzing noise coming from the other side of the wall, and after a moment’s puzzlement he identified the dying screams of a broken alarm clock still attempting to wake its owner despite the destruction of all the mechanisms intended to perform this task. Then another thump, and even that was silenced. It was possible Cú Chulainn had crawled out of bed to destroy the clock himself, but it seemed more likely he’d thrown a heavy book at it, crushing whatever was left.

Láeg had been intending to knock on the fresher’s door, but decided the peril of meeting the same ignoble fate was too high, and retreated to the kitchen instead. A slice of bread in hand, he glowered at the toaster. “Are you going to cooperate today?” he asked it, or tried to; his mouth was still dry and the words came out mangled and barely coherent. The toaster didn’t answer, but he could have sworn it was glaring balefully back at him, and that didn’t seem like a good sign.

He put the bread in anyway, and then went in search of a cup of tea.

Fifteen minutes later, fortified by caffeine and a piece of toast that wasn’t as burned as it might have been, he filled a second mug and padded uncertainly down the corridor to knock on Cú Chulainn’s door. There was no response.

“Heard your alarm go off,” he said, for want of anything better. “Er. Wondered if you wanted a cup of tea.”

There was a muffled sound that might have been somebody with a duvet over their face telling somebody else to go away.

Láeg probably should’ve just left him to sleep, but he’d seen the kid’s timetable, and with so few contact hours in a week he probably shouldn’t miss one of his few lectures. Turned out he really was doing theology, which was – well. He’d have to ask about that some other time. Most of the theology students he knew were either staunch atheists or absolute Jesus freaks, and although he doubted Cú Chulainn was the latter, he was giving it a bit more time to figure out what angle to take.

He turned the door handle experimentally. Unlocked.

“I’m coming in,” he said, and was immediately hit by such a profound sense of turning into his mother that he hated himself for just a few seconds, before the mood was overtaken by the thought, _Well, why shouldn’t I? My mother’s fucking great._ “If you’re naked I suggest you grab a pillow or something. Unless you’re cool with that. I don’t care.”

There was another muffled sound, this time suggesting that there was no need for grabbing pillows since the boy was already buried beneath several layers of bedclothes, and by the way Láeg could go fuck himself.

“Yeah, okay.” Láeg flicked on the light and regarded the miserable heap on the bed. He could just about see one of Cú Chulainn’s feet sticking out at one end, and a few strands of hair, but otherwise his flatmate was completely invisible. “I brought you tea. I’m putting it on your bedside table. Don’t knock it over.”

This time the words were easier to discern: “You’re not my dad.”

“You’re damn right I’m not,” said Láeg. “Do you want the cup of tea or not?”

A hand emerged from beneath the duvet, and then a head. “Why are you here?”

“Heard you waging war on your alarm clock. Thought it might need reinforcements, but it looks like you’ve already won the battle.” The alarm clock in question lay in a sorry heap of broken plastic and crushed electronics. There was a black mark on the wall where it had hit. There was also a large dent, but he suspected that had more to do with the hardback dictionary that had followed the clock than the timepiece itself.

Cú Chulainn opened one eye, then winced and closed it again. “Can you at least turn the light off?”

Láeg had been out late the night before, so he hadn’t been there to witness what his flatmate might have got up to in his absence, but he didn’t think Cú Chulainn was hungover, even if he was acting like it. And by the time he’d come home, just before two, there’d been no movement in the flat, so it’s not even like he went to bed that late.

 _Still,_ thought Láeg to himself, _teenagers need more sleep than adults_.

“Nope,” he said aloud. “I get the feeling your dads would prefer it if you actually go to lectures, and that if you don’t, they’ll find some way of blaming it on me. So it’s time to get up.”

“Hnnngghh.” This might have originated as actual words, but it was hard to tell when Cú Chulainn’s face was smushed into the pillow.

“Anyone would think you didn’t want to go to…” Láeg checked the sheet on the desk. “Er, _Introductory New Testament Greek._ ” He put the paper down. “Really? Okay, no wonder you don’t want to get up. Though I’m pleased to see you’re putting your Greek dictionary to good use and employing it in the war against alarm clocks. I’m sure that’s exactly what its compiler hoped you’d do with it.”

“Fuck off, Láeg,” said Cú Chulainn.

“And after I brought you a cup of tea, too. Kids these days have no manners.”

“ _Please_ would you kindly fuck off, Láeg.”

“Not the problem I had with that sentence.”

“If you go away, I’ll get up.” Cú Chulainn’s head emerged from below the blankets long enough to glare at Láeg, and then he wrinkled his nose. “Did you burn your toast again?”

“No, you’re having a stroke,” said Láeg. “Yes, I burned the toast again. The toaster has it in for me. You’ll notice I didn’t bring you a piece.”

“Well, for that at least I’m grateful.” He groped around for the cup of tea. Láeg retrieved the mug before Cú Chulainn’s flailing hand could knock it to the floor, and held it just out of reach.

“You have to sit up before I’m giving this back.”

“Oh, for fuck’s—“ Cú Chulainn pushed himself upright. “I thought you said you weren’t going to be my surrogate parent.”

“I’m not,” said Láeg. “Annoying older brother, though…”

He managed to put the cup of tea down before Cú Chulainn threw the pillow at him.

He did not, however, manage to duck before it hit him in the face.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cú Chulainn has his first pas de deux class. Láeg, Fergus, and Cormac have a group chat.

Cú Chulainn rarely left the house except to go to his occasional lectures, and while he mostly kept to his room, Láeg’s days were still soundtracked by the sound of him swearing at his essays and periodically throwing something. Usually a book. Usually at the wall.

So it was almost a relief when he went out on Tuesday evening, snatching up his bag and a cereal bar from the kitchen and heading out before Láeg could say anything about the fact he’d tied his hair back. It somehow made him look younger, and at the same time completely ageless, but he probably wouldn’t have appreciated that remark.

With the flat to himself, Láeg texted Cormac: _you busy?_

_Until nine,_ came the reply a few minutes later. _Why?_

_Got the flat to myself,_ he answered. _Wondered if you wanted to come over._

_Aww, are you lonely?_ Then, a moment later, a notification pinged from their group chat with Fergus: _Láeg’s got attached to the fresher already. Now he’s lonely whenever the kid’s out._

_I think it’s cute,_ Fergus wrote back, before Láeg could object to this interpretation. _You’re such a mum friend._

_I am_ not _a mum friend,_ Láeg told them both. _And I’m not lonely either._

_You totally are,_ said Fergus, and was angry-reacted for his trouble. _A mum friend, that is, I’m not saying you’re lonely. And I don’t know why you’re angry-reacting me. That’s not a bad thing._

_Because I’m not a mum friend,_ said Láeg.

_You’ve known him a WEEK,_ said Cormac, _and you’re already attached. Mum friend._

_You mumfriended the entire LGBTQ+ society last year,_ added Fergus. _Which really wasn’t your job._

That wasn’t true. The welfare officer hadn’t been doing his job properly, and, well, if Láeg had occasionally made cups of tea for the scared fresher gaybies and made it known that they could come to him for advice, so what? That was the whole committee’s job, that’s why the society existed in the first place.

_I just wanted to know if Cormac was free to come over, jfc,_ he said. _No need to make it into a thing. You’re both terrible._

_I’d come over, if I were there,_ said Fergus. _Where is the fresher, anyway?_

_Dance._ He didn’t think that was really a secret, and it wasn’t like his friends were going to tell anyone. _Pas de deux, apparently. Some girl talked him into it._

Cormac sent them both a gif of a dancer leaping across a stage, trailing rainbows that somebody had edited in.

Fergus added a dancing emoji.

Cormac remarked, _I can meet you at nine for a drink if you want, but he’ll be back by then, so you won’t be lonely anymore._

_Ha ha._ Láeg hoped his full stop fully conveyed his unimpressed mood. _Want to come over here? I cba to walk to the pub tonight._

Fergus sad-reacted them both.

_You didn’t have to leave, Fergus, stop sad-reacting us._

_He kind of did,_ Cormac replied. _But yeah. Stop sad-reacting us. We’ll skype you if you’re really desperate._

_That’s a point,_ said Fergus. _Did you hear Naoise has WiFi now? Didn’t even know you could get signal out there._

_Didn’t even know he wasn’t dead in a ditch,_ said Láeg. _Haven’t heard from him since he left._ Not that he was bitter at being left in the lurch by both of his prospective flatmates or anything.

_He only got in touch yesterday,_ said Fergus. _Apparently Conall’s been to visit – god knows how he found out where they were. He told him to get in touch._ A shrug emoji. Then a phone emoji. _We could do a group call._

There was a moment’s silence in the chat. Cormac’s “…” popped up several times, and then vanished again as he clearly thought better of whatever he was going to say. Finally: _You miss us._

_Of course I miss you,_ said Fergus, only to be immediately heart-reacted by both of them. _But not if you’re gonna make it weird. God._

Láeg messaged Cormac privately again: _So? You coming over?_

Cormac: _to yours? I’d rather go to the pub._

Láeg: _you’re trying to bankrupt me._

Cormac: _you’re funded. You’ve got that sweet sweet grant money._

Láeg: _and you have a job, what’s your point?_

Fergus, to the group chat: _Are you guys talking about me behind my back?_

Láeg: _No, we’re talking about Cormac’s nefarious plan to steal all my money._

Cormac, privately: _you know those chocolate chip cookies you made last year for the dnd group?_

Láeg, to Cormac: _what about them?_

Láeg, to the group chat: _Also apparently my cookie recipe, or something._

Fergus, to the group chat: _god, those cookies._

Cormac, to Láeg: _bake some of those and I’ll come over, whether or not the fresher’s home._

Láeg, to the group chat: _not you as well._

Láeg, to Cormac: _you drive a hard bargain. I don’t even know if I’ve got the ingredients._ He glanced across at the cupboards. He already knew he didn’t; he hadn’t done any proper food shopping in days.

Cormac, to Láeg: _pub, then._

Cormac, to the group chat: _he doesn’t love me enough to make me cookies. Fergus, come back so he’ll make them for us again?!_

Láeg, to the group chat: _I hate both of you._

Láeg, moments later: _here’s the recipe. Cormac, I’ll see you at the pub._

*

A little after eight, the front door slammed shut. A few seconds later, Cú Chulainn’s bedroom door followed suit.

Láeg glanced up from his place at the kitchen table, wondering if he should investigate. He’d expected his flatmate back earlier, given that the dance class finished at quarter past seven and it was only a fifteen-minute walk from here to the sports centre. Presumably something hadn’t gone well, if the slammed doors were any indicator.

Should he go and knock? He had half an hour before he needed to head out to meet Cormac…

Láeg was spared the moral quandary by his flatmate’s reappearance. Cú Chulainn headed straight for the kitchen, filling the kettle and rummaging in his cupboard until he found a packet of biscuits, before eating three in a row.

“So?” said Láeg. “How was it?”

The boy turned, apparently noticing Láeg’s presence for the first time. He’d changed out of his dance gear and was now wearing a dressing gown – and apparently, not a whole lot else. “What?”

“How was it?”

“Fine.”

Láeg raised his eyebrow. “Right. How was the scary Scottish lady?”

“Both scary and Scottish,” said Cú Chulainn, a little reluctantly, as though he sensed that he wasn’t going to escape the interrogation. “Incredible dancer, though.”

“And was it relentlessly cishet? Did you have to lift anyone?”

“No, and no. Actually, it wasn’t gendered at all. She…” Cú Chulainn broke off momentarily, fidgeting with his packet of biscuits. “She organised the whole thing by height.”  

Ah. Maybe that explained his mood. “Let me guess,” said Láeg. “You were dancing the women’s part.”

The boy scowled. “She didn’t call it that, but it’s clear that’s what it was. There were more girls there than guys, so some of _them_ got to do the men’s parts, but did I? Nope. Because I’m too short. It’s not fair,” he added plaintively. “There must be short ballet dancers out there.”

“Baryshnikov is only like five foot five.” Láeg eyed him, trying to judge on sight how tall Cú Chulainn was. Not five foot five by a long way, but he wasn’t about to point it out.

“How do you even know that?”

“I know a lot of things.” Truth be told, he didn’t know why that particularly factoid had stuck in his head. He also had a sneaking suspicion that being five foot five hadn’t made life all that easy for Baryshnikov. “It’s not all bad, though, right? You were worried about switching roles. At least this way you didn’t have to lift anyone.”

“I was the _only_ boy dancing that part.”

Okay, Láeg could see why that might make him feel dysphoric, but— “How many guys were there?”

“… Six.”

“Out of?”

“Eighteen.”

“A lot of lesbian pas de deux going on, then. Who’d they pair you with? A netball player?”

At this, Cú Chulainn flushed bright red and turned away. “No,” he said. The kettle had boiled, and he spent several seconds trying and failing to pull the lid off his hot chocolate before remembering it was a screw lid.

Interesting. “Were they nice?”

“I guess,” he mumbled.

“You guess.”

“He was—“ Cú Chulainn shrugged. “Blond.”

Oh. “You danced with this guy for two hours and that’s all you can tell me about him?”

“No!” His hand shook, spilling hot chocolate powder all over the counter.

Láeg, to the group chat: _I think the fresher has a crush. It’s intensely adorable._

“So he’s blond and he’s presumably taller than you. Anything else?”

Fergus: _oh my god tell me everything_

Láeg: _they were partners for pas de deux. He’s blond. That’s all I know._

“Why do you care, anyway?”

“You just spilled hot chocolate all over the counter because your hands are shaking so much. Is it exhaustion and muscle fatigue that’s got you so worked up, or is it your crush on this mysterious boy?”

Cormac: _Láeg, you’re terrible._

Cú Chulainn swept hot chocolate powder from the work surface into his hand and dumped it in the sink. “I do not have a crush on him.”

“Sure you don’t.”

Fergus: _they were PARTNERS for PAS DE DEUX??_

Fergus: _is this a gay pas de deux class or was the fresher dancing the girl’s part_

“I’m just – tired.”

Láeg: _the teacher split them up by height and he’s tiny. So, gay pas de deux class._

“Mm-hmm.”

“Who are you texting, anyway?”

“No one.” Láeg turned his phone over so that the screen was hidden. He caught sight of a stream of rainbow emojis from Fergus as he did so. “What’s his name, then, this tall blond boy of yours?”

He didn’t think it was possible for Cú Chulainn to blush any more than he already was, but his ears went dangerously pink. “Ferdia,” he said at last. “His name is Ferdia.”

“Oh?”

“Drop it, Láeg.”

“But you’re going back next week, right?”

Cú Chulainn mumbled something, the words lost between the scraping of his spoon around his mug as he stirred his hot chocolate.

“I didn’t catch that.”

“I said I’m seeing him on Friday.”

*

Láeg to the group chat, several minutes later: _his name’s Ferdia_

Then, without waiting for a reply: _they’re meeting up this Friday_

Fergus: _!!!_

Láeg: _to go to see that weird experimental dance thing the dance soc is doing_

Fergus heart-reacted the message, and then, for good measure, sent several heart emojis and a rainbow. _That’s the cutest thing I’ve ever heard._

Cormac: _Fergus why are you so invested in the love life of a fresher you’ve never even met_

Fergus: _just because you’re heartless doesn’t mean we all are_

Fergus: _I see you angry-reacting me, Cormac. Láeg, tell him he’s heartless._

Cormac, to Láeg: _don’t tell Fergus but. is it as adorable as it sounds because it sounds extremely adorable_

Láeg, to the group chat: _don’t be fooled, Fergus, he’s absolutely as invested in this as you are_

Cormac, to both the group chat and Láeg, separately: _I hate you._

Láeg: _we’re still on for the pub, though, right?_


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “What are you doing?” came Cú Chulainn’s voice from the doorway.  
> “Procrastinating,” said Láeg, glancing up at him. “With a side order of bribery. What are you doing?”  
> “Procrastinating,” admitted his flatmate.

Láeg was crouching by the oven door, trying to check whether he’d spaced the cookies out enough or whether he was going to end up with a solid chocolate chip mass that had be to hacked apart with a spatula. Not that he didn’t like the idea of a giant baking tray-sized cookie, but it wasn’t entirely what he was aiming for.

“What are you doing?” came Cú Chulainn’s voice from the doorway.

“Procrastinating,” said Láeg, glancing up at him. “With a side order of bribery. What are _you_ doing?”

“Procrastinating,” admitted his flatmate. “Without the bribery. Who are you bribing, your supervisor?”

Láeg was slightly offended and more than a little concerned that the kid would leap to that conclusion. “No, obviously not. Because I don’t actually want to get kicked out.”

“Whatever.” He crouched down beside Láeg, peering into the oven. “Cookies?”

“I made them last year for my friends. Now they won’t stop nagging me to make them again. What are you procrastinating on?”

“Greek translation. The trouble is that even once I’ve translated it, it doesn’t get any more interesting.” He slumped from his crouch into a sitting position, back against the cabinet next to the oven, legs crossed like a child in a school assembly. “Sometimes I think I chose the wrong subject.”

“I’ve been meaning to ask about that,” said Láeg. He opened the oven and turned the tray around to help the cookies bake more evenly. Definitely too close together. Ah, well. Square cookies would taste just as good. “What made you pick theology, of all things?”

“Well…” Cú Chulainn shrugged. “In all honesty, it’s mostly because I thought it would piss off my dad. He wanted me to do something useful. Something that would give me a skill, you know?”

“Ah. Didn’t want you to do a useless arts subject?”

“It’s not even that. He’d have been happy enough if I’d come out of it with a degree in fine art or music. He’s got two MAs himself and they’re both in weird artsy shit that no STEM student would consider worth the time of day, but he studied medicine first, so people overlook that fact.”

Láeg only met Súaltaim briefly, but he didn’t seem like the type, which must mean his flatmate was talking about his other father. “He has two MAs and studied medicine?”

“Yup.”

“Wow, no pressure.”

“Tell me about it. I feel like I’ll have to get a PhD if I ever want to be able to argue with him successfully.”

“Isn’t that why everyone gets a PhD?” said Láeg. “To argue with people? Sometimes you just need letters after your name so you can thinkshame with impunity.”

Cú Chulainn laughed. “Is that your plan?”

Doing a PhD would mean getting funding. Láeg had been unexpectedly lucky in the grant department so far, but he didn’t think it was going to carry him through. It certainly looked unlikely he’d be able to stay here, although Fergus had been talking about a few scholarships in his department, so maybe he’d be able to transfer. “Gotta finish my Master’s first,” he said. “Which won’t happen if I keep baking cookies instead of writing up my lit review, but eh. YOLO and all that.”

“What a profound philosophy,” said Cú Chulainn, with a slightly mocking tone that was rich coming from a tiny seventeen-year-old sitting cross-legged on the kitchen floor wearing tracksuit bottoms, an oversized _Swan Lake_ souvenir t-shirt, and an unbelted green dressing gown.

“It ain’t wrong, though,” Láeg pointed out. “You still haven’t explained why you ended up doing theology.”

“It’s not that interesting. I could’ve done any number of things and Dad would’ve been happy enough, so long as they had some kind of obvious career progression, but theology’s not what he’d think of as vocational.” Cú Chulainn put on a deep voice and a slight accent. “You know, son, we already know you’re queer. It’s the twenty-first century, you’re not bound for the priesthood.” He pulled a face. “He’s had some bad experiences with the church.”

“Ah,” said Láeg, in what he hoped was an understanding tone. “Because of being gay?”

“And because he’s a polytheist.”

Láeg looked at him. He didn’t appear to be joking. “I don’t know why I’m surprised,” he said. “The way my life is going, at this point I should know better.”

Cú Chulainn laughed. “Point is, he’s been encouraging me to think about the future since I was, like, eleven. Family holidays somehow always involved visiting universities – at least once they no longer involved taking a tour of every theatre ever. He was hoping the dance thing would work out,” he added. “It didn’t. For obvious reasons.”

_Obvious reasons_ presumably being the fact that he was trans and tiny and had spent too long training the kind of muscles a female dancer would need to switch easily into men’s roles. Láeg wanted to offer some platitude about it not being too late, but he suspected it probably was. Weren’t you meant to start professional training at the age of ten or something like that if you wanted to make it in the dance world?

Besides, he hadn’t got the impression that was actually what his flatmate wanted. “So you picked theology to spite him.”

“More or less. I thought I’d like it more than I actually do, though.”

“It’s early days.” The timer beeped, and Láeg hunted around for the oven gloves before realising they were literally right there. “You’ve had, what, a week of lectures? I’m pretty sure everyone thinks they picked the wrong subject when they’re that new to it.”

“Hmm.” He didn’t sound convinced. “Are those cookies meant to be one large slab?”

“Nope.” Láeg fetched his spatula and began cutting them into biscuit-sized pieces. “But who cares?”

Too late he realised he didn’t actually have a cooling rack to put them on. Right. Because last time he made these was in Fergus’s kitchen, and Fergus actually owned that kind of stuff – or one of his flatmates did, but either way it had been a significantly better-equipped baking experiment than any that happened in Láeg’s own home. He fetched a plate instead and put them on there. Good enough.

Cú Chulainn watched him wordlessly as he began to dump more blobs of dough on the still-hot baking tray, spacing them out more this time. His gaze was a little uncanny, and Láeg wondered what he was looking for.  

“So,” he said once the new batch of cookies were in the oven, more to break the silence than because he cared. “Why here? I wasn’t aware we were particularly well-known for theology, as a university.”

“Oh, family tradition,” said Cú Chulainn airily. “Most of my family went here. My dads weren’t sure about me starting uni so young, but they compromised on letting me come here where they know there are people to keep an eye on me. Of course,” he added, raising his eyebrow, “they didn’t know you’d adopt me.”

“I have _not_ adopted you,” said Láeg.

“Keep telling yourself that.” Cú Chulainn levered himself up off the floor and wandered over to the plate of cooling biscuits. They smelled good, even if they weren’t as aesthetically pleasing as you might have hoped.

“Don’t touch those.”

Cú Chulainn withdrew his hand. “Whatever, Mum.”

“Oh my _god_.” Láeg leaned forward and very gently knocked his forehead against the kitchen cabinets. “Do you ever just hear yourself speak and know what you’re saying but it’s too late to stop it? That’s me every time I talk to you. How are you doing this?”

His flatmate shrugged. “Obviously it’s my waifish appearance and innocent eyes. It brings out the natural mumfriend in you.”

Fuck. Fergus was right. “I _am_ kind of a mumfriend, aren’t I?” he said ruefully. “Shit. Guess the uni housing department aren’t as stupid as they seem, dumping you here. They must’ve known this would happen.”

“Or, you know, you had spare rooms.”

“Or that.” Láeg’s phone pinged at him. He ignored it, only for several more notifications to come through in close succession, practically falling over each other. Frowning, he unlocked the screen to see what was going on.

Fergus, to the group chat: _okay so I know this is going to sound intensely creepy but_

Cormac: _oh no_

Fergus: _the ballet club posted pictures on their facebook page from some of their classes_

Cormac: _have you been stalking Láeg’s flatmate_

Fergus: _as if_

Fergus: _I don’t even know what he looks like_

Fergus: _so I wasn’t sure which one he was_

Cormac: _you’re such a weirdo_

Fergus: _but you said he was tiny and dancing with a blond boy, right? So…_

He’d sent a picture, grainy and obviously cropped from one he’d downloaded from Facebook. Cú Chulainn’s face wasn’t visible; it was hidden by the curve of his partner’s arm as they leaned, hands joined, bearing each other’s weight in an act of profound trust given that they’d only just met.

Fergus: _Láeg? Is that him?_

“What’s the emergency?” said Cú Chulainn, watching him scroll through the stream of messages.

“Nothing.” It was definitely him. “Group chat shenanigans.”

“Oh.” His flatmate seemed surprised by that. “You’re in a group chat?”

“Who _isn’t_ in a group chat?” asked Láeg; that wasn’t the kind of question he’d expected.

“Well, I’ve only seen you interact with, like, one friend since I moved in. I didn’t realise you… had any others.”

“Ouch,” said Láeg, putting his hand on his heart. “That cuts deep. Did you really just say you didn’t think I had enough friends to be in a group chat?”

Cú Chulainn shrugged. “I don’t know. What are they talking about?”

The most truthful answer would be to say, _You, and also your cute dance partner_ , but the truth wasn’t necessarily the _right_ answer, and Láeg erred on the side of outright lying in this particular instance. “Terrible memes that I don’t even get,” he said, turning down the volume on his phone.

Láeg, to the group chat: _I can’t believe you stalked my flatmate_

“Your cookies are burning.”

“Shit.” This batch looked more like actual cookies than the last lot, but they were significantly darker, too. He rescued them before they could turn to charcoal, and then peeked at his phone’s screen again.

Fergus: _he’s got good taste in boys though_

Cormac: _he’s seventeen, Fergus_

Fergus: _so? Age of consent is sixteen. He’s free to bang whoever he wants._

Cormac: _oh my god_

Fergus: _all I’m saying is, that kid’s cute_

Cormac: _he’s a FRESHER_

Fergus: _jfc I didn’t mean *I* was interested. Can’t a guy have opinions on aesthetics without someone making it weird?_

Láeg: _can we please not talk about the potential sex life of my tiny flatmate thank you_

Láeg: _although Fergus is right_

Láeg: _about it being legal, I mean. Which is good, because it means I don’t have to try and stop him making any bad decisions. His bad decisions are his responsibility alone._

Láeg: _I have no opinions on the cuteness of his dance partner._

Cormac: _well that’s definitely a lie_

“You sure have a lot to say about a meme you didn’t understand,” said Cú Chulainn.

Láeg glanced up from his phone. “The conversation… digressed.”

“Right.”

Fergus: _there are like four more pictures of them and I’m no dancer but it looks like they’re both pretty good_

Láeg: _I told you, he used to dance competitively_

“Who is it you’re bribing with these cookies anyway?”

Cormac: _competitive ballet is such a weird world tbh, no wonder he’s a bit… well, you know_

Fergus: _how would you know what competitive ballet is like_

Cormac: _my cousin used to dance, remember? I had to go to one of the competitions to chaperone when I was like fifteen. It was horrific. Nobody who does that voluntarily has all their braincells intact if you ask me_

“Drinking buddy,” said Láeg, because it was the simplest answer and his brain was struggling to balance two conversations at once.

“Can I have one?”

He could have said no, but he felt guilty about the way his friends were discussing the kid, so he just nodded. “One of the square ones,” he added. “They’re bigger anyway.”

Cú Chulainn grinned and excavated the largest cookie from the bottom of the pile, before vanishing back into his room. Láeg watched him go for a second – his dancer’s grace, his childish smile – and then took a picture of the plate of cookies and sent it to the group chat.

Láeg: _come and meet him yourself, if you’re that interested._

A sad-react from Fergus. _Now you’re just torturing me._

Láeg: _I’ll post you some??_

This earned a thumbs-up and a stream of emojis, most of them cookies with an envelope or two in the mix.

Fergus: _they’d probably go off though :’( I wish you could email food_

Láeg: _next time you visit I’ll make you some. @Cormac cat got your tongue?_

Cormac: _I was putting my shoes on. I’m coming over right now._

Láeg: _like right this second?_

Cormac: _well yeah, I don’t trust you not to eat them all_

Fergus: _I stg you better keep me in the loop, Cormac_

Cormac: _or what?_

Fergus: _or I’ll drag Conall back from Scotland to go yell at you once he’s done nagging Naoise to stop ghosting us all_

Láeg: _lmao, terrifying_

Cormac: _no that actually is terrifying_

Fergus sent them all a series of smiling devil emojis.

Cormac, to Láeg: _amazing. Even halfway across the country he can still threaten me._

Láeg, to Cormac: _why are you scared of Conall anyway?_

Cormac: _I’m not scared of him. I just don’t want him mad at me. Long story._

Cormac, to the group chat: _I’ll make sure to liveblog the experience of eating those delicious cookies, Fergus_

Fergus: _fuck you, Cormac_

Cormac: _love you too_


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cormac comes over to visit. Featuring cookies and existential crises.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW: brief (accidental) deadnaming

Cú Chulainn hadn’t reappeared by the time Cormac texted to say he was outside, so Láeg hadn’t had a chance to warn him that someone was coming over. Going by the pattern of his behaviour over the last few days, it was possible he wouldn’t emerge at all, but Láeg was sure he could think of a pretext to lure him out before the evening was done. Possibly it would involve cookies.

The inhabitants of the flat opposite seemed to have picked tonight to host a party, and the thumping bass of their music was already filling the stairwell. Láeg had never met any of them, but he’d heard rumours about the couple who lived there. Or possibly only one of them lived there, and her boyfriend just stayed over a lot? He wasn’t sure. He didn’t really care, either, but based on the rumours, he felt sorry for the people who had to live with the two of them.

“You could’ve knocked,” he said, opening the door. The moment he did, the noise intensified to uncomfortable volume.

“I did,” said Cormac, wincing. “But I didn’t think you’d hear me over this racket. Does this happen a lot?”

“Not so far,” said Láeg. “I’m hoping it doesn’t become a habit.” He closed the door and felt the assault on his eardrums lessen; Cormac sagged in relief.

“Freshers?” he said, and it took Láeg a moment to realise his friend was asking about the flat opposite.

“Don’t think so. Not all of them, for sure. Just noisemakers. Tea?”

“Sure, why not, let’s be middle-aged about it.” He unlaced his boots and slipped them off, adding them to the pile of shoes next to the door. “How very domestic of you to trust each other not to steal your shoes. Oh, wait.” He held up one of Cú Chulainn’s, which looked comically tiny in his hands. “How long do you think it’s been since you could fit into a shoe this size?”

“I was a size five by the time I was eleven,” said Láeg, “so… a while.” He didn’t tell Cormac that the size four shoe was actually slightly too big for his flatmate.

“That’s adorable.” His friend returned it to the pile. “Not a bad flat. And they still haven’t put anyone in the other two rooms?”

“Nope.” Láeg wedged the door to the living area open with a heavy book Cú Chulainn had left on the table. “They’ll probably send us an exchange student who is only here for a term, or something. For now, I got lucky.”

“Except for the fact they gave you a seventeen-year-old as a flatmate.” Cormac eyed him as he spoke. “Though you seem to have adapted to that pretty fast.”

Láeg shrugged. “He’s not so bad. Talks too much once he gets started, but the rest of the time I hardly know he’s there.”

From the other end of the hallway was a heavy thud and some loud, inventive cursing. They both looked at the closed door, waiting for the swearing to stop. When it finally subsided, Cormac raised his eyebrow. “You were saying?”

Láeg looked uneasily at his flatmate’s bedroom door. “I should… do you think I should check if he’s okay?”

“He’ll come out if he’s not,” said Cormac confidently. “So? Where are these cookies I was promised?”

“Kitchen.” Láeg led the way, snatching up the kettle and filling it as he passed. “They’re kinda burned. And/or square. But they still taste like cookies.”

“Please, as if I’m fussy. Half the reason I stayed in academia was for the free food.” Cormac took a couple of biscuits, biting into one and closing his eyes in pretend (or possibly real) bliss. “You haven’t lost the knack of it. Pity the D&D group fell apart.”

“Yeah, well, Naoise vanished, Fergus fucked off, Conall’s hardly ever in the country…” He hunted around for a mug that actually had a handle, since both of his favourites had lost theirs in washing up accidents. “I guess if Naoise’s got WiFi now we could try and host a session via Discord, but there’d be no cookies involved.”

“Well, then, what’s the point of that?” Cormac drummed his fingers on the counter, looking thoughtful. “Do you think it’s weird that he didn’t contact us?”

“You mean the part where I had to find out from Fergus that he wasn’t dead?” Láeg had been trying not to think about it too much. It was Naoise’s choice if he wanted to start over in whatever communication desert he’d found himself in, but the fact that he’d messaged Fergus without bothering to reply to any of Láeg’s messages rankled a little bit. “Yeah, kinda. I guess they were always closer, though.”

“He’s my _cousin_ ,” Cormac pointed out. “And I knew as much as you did.”

That was actually kind of a relief; at least it meant Naoise didn’t just hate Láeg personally. “You have, like, a zillion cousins.”

“Not the point.”

“Well, yeah, I think it’s weird. But I’m glad he’s okay. Or as okay as anyone can be when they’ve dropped out of uni and moved to some godforsaken Scottish island with their girlfriend.” He opened the fridge. “We’re out of milk. Again. Is black tea okay?”

“At this point I literally do not care,” said Cormac. “What are preferences? What does it mean to like or dislike things? My life has no structure and everything is meaningless.” He took another biscuit. “Except for these cookies. These cookies give my life meaning.”

Láeg closed the fridge door and looked at him. “Life outside academia’s treating you that well, huh.”

Cormac’s grin was almost a grimace. “I mean. I’m being dramatic. But I also have no idea what I’m supposed to do now? Like, do I transfer? Do I give up on the whole idea of doing a PhD at all? Is there any answer to this that doesn’t involve either letting my dad off the hook, or getting disowned? I haven’t found it, if there is. And I hate my job. I have a fucking _masters_ and there are eighteen-year-olds who barely scraped an A-Level doing the same thing for the same money, which makes me think the whole thing was a waste of fucking time.”

“You think he’d disown you?” asked Láeg, latching onto an earlier part of his friend’s rant.

“Yes. No. I don’t know.” He sighed. “Probably not. But I feel like there’d be a lot of bad feelings if I left, and it would be easier to keep out of each other’s way for a few years, which is more or less the same thing. Not that it’s any better at the moment. I thought things were improving, but it seems like I was wrong.”

“I’m sorry.” Cookies felt like an inadequate offering.

“Yeah. So that’s fun!” Cormac took his mug of tea, apparently grateful to have something else to look at. “Anyway. I’m not here to talk about my poor relationship with my father or my complete inability to envisage alternative futures for myself outside of research. That’s what therapy’s for.”

Láeg wrapped his hands around his own mug. “Yikes.”

The sound of a door opening elsewhere in the flat distracted them both momentarily, and they fell silent as Cú Chulainn wandered in. He glanced disinterestedly at them both. “Hey, Cormac,” he said, opening the fridge. “Fuck, I forgot to get milk. I’m sorry.”

Cormac stared at him for a second, and then realisation dawned. “Sétanta? Wait, no, fuck, I’m sorry. You changed it. Obviously you changed it. Cú Chulainn, right? Sorry. I fucked up. Won’t happen again.”

Láeg looked between the two of them – at the recognition on Cormac’s face, the hurt and resignation on Cú Chulainn’s – and tried to make sense of what he was seeing. “You know each other?” he said eventually.

“He’s my cousin,” said Cú Chulainn, like this should have been obvious. He was still standing by the fridge, as though another carton of milk might magically appear if he stared long enough at the space where it was supposed to be.

“I… Yeah.” Cormac sounded momentarily dumfounded, then rounded on Láeg: “You never told me his name!”

“You never asked!” said Láeg, half a dozen pennies dropping simultaneously. Cormac’s cousin was a competitive dancer. Cormac had been to one of his cousin’s competitions, to chaperone. Cú Chulainn used to compete, but hadn’t since coming out. Probably, they hadn’t seen each other much in that time; Cormac was several years older and there was no particular reason they’d have crossed paths. Plus, with the current state of Cormac’s family relationships, it made sense that he wouldn’t have been told his baby cousin was starting uni, and if he hadn’t seen Cú Chulainn since he transitioned, it would make sense that he wouldn’t have made the connection. And Cú Chulainn had _told_ him that he had family here, hadn’t he?

“Your flatmate is my cousin,” Cormac said, as though trying to process this. “Fuck. _Fuck_. Okay, several things make sense now. But still. _Fuck_.”

Cú Chulainn closed the fridge door. “I thought you suspended your studies,” he said to Cormac. “That’s what your dad said.”

“I did.”

“He just can’t quit my baking,” said Láeg. There was a weird feeling in the air – not exactly _tension_ , but close enough to be uncomfortable, a prickling that had begun the moment Cormac used what must have been Cú Chulainn’s deadname – and he felt the need to try and lighten it. But his words fell flat, and an awkward silence fell.

Then his flatmate looked at him and said, “Let me guess. You know Naoise and Conall too.”

Láeg nodded. “How many cousins do you guys even have, anyway?”

Cormac’s mouth twitched. “A lot.” To Cú Chulainn, he added: “We used to play D&D together.”

“Oh?”

“And thus the cookie recipe was born,” said Láeg, before adding, “Fergus was the DM.” He was pretty sure Fergus wasn’t one of Cú Chulainn’s cousins, but it seemed reasonable they’d have crossed paths. Sure enough, he saw a flicker of surprise in his flatmate’s face.

“Fergus used to be Cú Chulainn’s tutor,” Cormac said helpfully to Láeg. He hesitated only momentarily on the name, but it was there, and they’d all heard it.

“I missed a lot of school because of dance,” said Cú Chulainn, by way of explanation. “He helped me catch up.”

The awkward silence stretched out again. Empires rose and fell. New stars were born; old ones formed supernovas. The haphazard pile of books on the table teetered and then hesitated, as though afraid to topple under the weight of the silence but unable to resist.

Simultaneously, Láeg and Cormac’s phones pinged.

Láeg picked his up.

Fergus: _this radio silence better be because Cormac was mugged on the way over and is currently being nursed back to health by Nurse Láeg_

“It’s Fergus,” he said. It felt rude not to, with Cú Chulainn standing right there. “He’s… berating us for not messaging him.”

“Ah,” said Cú Chulainn. “So _this_ is your mysterious group chat.”

“You told him about Library Exiles?” said Cormac.

“Hard not to, when the two of you are exploding my phone.” He messaged Fergus back: _why am I the nurse in this scenario??_

“You were talking about me, weren’t you?” Cú Chulainn asked.

Láeg was unable to keep the guilty expression off his face, but he attempted to deny it anyway: “What makes you say that?”

Fergus: _because you’re the mumfriend, obviously_

Cú Chulainn raised his eyebrow. “What else would you talk about? Clearly I’m the most interesting thing in your life right now.”

And with that he snatched a biscuit from the much-depleted plate and left the kitchen, nudging aside the book holding the door so that it closed behind him.

Cormac and Láeg watched him go. “Wow,” said Cormac. “He hasn’t changed at all.”

*

Fergus: _so????? what’s happening???_

Cormac: _so get this_

Cormac: _láeg’s flatmate… is my baby cousin._

Fergus: _holy shit! the one I tutored?_

Láeg: _apparently so *shrug*_

Fergus: _wow, you really are related to half the student body, aren’t you?_

Cormac: _idk the ratio has gone down considerably since naoise and conall left but. yeah. pretty much. so anyway, that was a fun discovery to make. and of course I immediately fucked it up and deadnamed him, which I feel terrible about. would’ve handled it better if I hadn’t been caught by surprise_

Láeg: _I’m sorry_

Cormac: _it’s not your fault_

Láeg: _it literally never occurred to me that you guys could know each other_

Fergus: _you know, actually, several things make sense now_

Fergus: _but still. fuck._

Cormac: _yeah, that’s exactly what I said._

Fergus: _how the fuck is he old enough to be at uni anyway. I swear he was like twelve last time I saw him_

Cormac: _well I can tell you one thing for sure_

Cormac: _he hasn’t got any taller_


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> legitimately considering renaming this fic "group chats of the ulster cycle" at this point...

In the time between Cormac’s visit on Tuesday and Cú Chulainn’s ‘not a date, we’re just meeting up, we were both gonna go to the show anyway’ on Friday, the flat settled into something like a companionable equilibrium. Láeg spent most of the day out, actually: his earlier procrastination came back to bite him, and his lit review deadline approached ominously fast. But when he came home in the evenings, there were no new dents in the wall, just a deep furrow in Cú Chulainn’s brow as he sat at his desk with his dictionary and several screwed-up balls of paper. He’d started propping his door open with a small grey wedge, but was frequently too deep in concentration to notice Láeg watching him.

On Friday afternoon, Láeg came home early. It wasn’t that he was planning to offer moral support and/or dating advice – he had neither to give – but he still felt it might be better if he were home before the fresher went out. Just in case.

He was unlacing his boots near the front door when Cú Chulainn snarled through gritted teeth and swept his work off his desk, indiscriminately dumping books, papers, and pens alike onto the stained carpet. “ _Fuck_ ,” he said, quietly and emphatically, and then more loudly: “Fuck. This.”

 “You okay?” said Láeg from the hallway, and the boy jumped, swivelling his desk chair to see who had spoken. He must have missed the click of the front door closing.

“Shit. I didn’t realise you were home. I’m fine, I—“ He hesitated, then turned his chair back round so that he could thump his head gently against the desk several times. “No,” he said, words now muffled by the wood. “No, I’m not fine. I hate this subject. It seems to be more about what we _can’t_ know or say than what we can. I don’t know why I thought I’d find answers here.”

“Answers to what?” Láeg asked, but his flatmate didn’t answer. He took off his other boot and then crossed the room, gathering up the fallen papers and books and putting them back on the desk in a haphazard-but-functional pile. “If you’re struggling, I’m sure your tutor—“

“It’s not that,” Cú Chulainn interrupted. “I can do it. It’s harder than school but I can do it, or could if I gave enough of a shit. I just don’t _care_.” He sighed and sat upright. “I thought I could motivate myself to get this done before I go out this evening—shit!”

“It’s only four o’clock,” said Láeg, when Cú Chulainn looked wildly around the room and failed to locate a clock that hadn’t been crushed into a miserable little pile of shards. “You’re fine on time. When’s this due?”

“Monday, but I wanted to get it out of the way so that I don’t have to look at it any longer than necessary.”

Láeg had spent enough time in his department’s common room during undergrad to know that freshers often struggled in their first couple of weeks. Many of them professed a hatred of their subject, usually brought on by overlong reading lists, crushing impostor syndrome, and the general difficulty with transitioning from school to uni. Until now, he’d assumed that Cú Chulainn’s unhappiness was similar, and that in time, it would pass. But this didn’t look like those first term blues.

“You know,” he ventured, “it’s not too late to transfer subjects.”

Was that hope he saw in his flatmate’s eyes? “It’s not?”

“You’d have to talk to your tutor and it would depend on spaces in whatever you pick, but… sure. I know like three people who transferred once they got here. Plus I’m sure they’d give leeway given your circumstances.”

“My circumstances?” Cú Chulainn repeated suspiciously.

“Well, you know, the fact that you’re so young…” Láeg trailed off. “Most people had longer to think about it. Plus, like, you’re related to half the uni, I’m sure they could pull some strings.”

His suspicion turned into an amused snort. “Yeah, if I wanted to do _politics_ , I’m sure my uncle could squeeze me in. What’s a bit of nepotism between family?”

Láeg was suddenly granted a vision of the future, and it looked a lot like reliving the Great Politics Department Schism of last year. He’d been through it once with Naoise, Fergus, and Cormac. He didn’t think he could go through it again. Whose side would Cormac take this time – his father’s or his baby cousin’s? Sure, so it _might_ work out better, but it seemed like it might be in the interests of their family relationships – not to mention the university as a whole – if no more members of their family ended up in that department.

Dreading the answer, he asked, “And _do_ you want to do politics?”

“Fuck no,” says Cú Chulainn, without even a second of hesitation, and Láeg’s unwelcome premonition faded back into blissful oblivion. “I don’t know what I’d do. Like I said, I kind of chose theology to annoy my dad. Which was a mistake, I’m realising that now. I should’ve picked something I actually liked. I didn’t _know_ I’d hate it, though.”

“I’m sure there are other things that would annoy him in their lack of direct vocational opportunities. What about history?”

“Yeah, maybe.” He took one of the pencils Láeg had retrieved from the floor and began rolling back and forth along the desk, listening to the juddering sound it made as each edge impacted the wood. “I don’t know. I hadn’t thought about it. I didn’t realise you could switch.”

“Well, think about it. Maybe mention to your tutor that you’re thinking about it. They might be able to give you some advice.”

“I guess.”

“But it doesn’t have to be today’s problem. Let’s talk about your date!”

“It’s not a date,” said Cú Chulainn, instantly more alert.

“You’re going to the theatre with a boy you definitely have a crush on. It’s a date.”

“Get out of my room, Láeg.”

“Have you decided what you’re going to wear? Please say you’re not going like that.” He’d been distracted by the conversation to notice before now, but his flatmate was wearing a combination of clothes that Láeg could only presume had been pulled out of his drawers at random: fuzzy green pyjama bottoms and a neon yellow workout top under a wide-necked purple t-shirt that was hanging off one shoulder. Wait, no: looking more closely, it was a regular t-shirt that had been attacked with a pair of scissors at some time in its life, leaving it asymmetrical and considerably less useful as a t-shirt. Once upon a time, it had had some kind of logo on it, and going on the evidence of the rest of the boy’s wardrobe, it was probably related to dance, but this one had been washed so many times it was barely visible.

“So what if I am?”

“Oh god,” said Láeg. “I have to call Cormac. His cousin is a fashion disaster.”

Cú Chulainn rolled his eyes. “I’m not going like this, Láeg. But I don’t see how it’s any of your business. Please get out of my room before this dictionary makes a rapid acquaintance with your face.”

“If you need any advice I’m sure—“

“I do not need advice from the person who thinks wearing lavender shirts with _that_ complexion is a good idea.”

“Lavender is a fucking gift.”

“Not when you’re ginger.”

“Ouch.” Láeg regarded him. “I feel like I just got bitten by a puppy. Adorable, and yet…”

His flatmate picked up the dictionary. “Face. Dictionary. The acquaintance between the two is getting more imminent with every word you say and every second that you’re still somehow in my room.”

Backing towards the door with his hands raised, Láeg said, “Fine. I’m going. But you should really consider doing something with your hair.”

“My hair is already doing something.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, it’s doing whatever the fuck it wants with no interference from me.”

“It looks like it.”

It wasn’t the dictionary that hit Láeg in the face at that point, just a large eraser, but it was thrown with terrifyingly good aim and managed to hit him right on the bridge of the nose, hard enough that he stumbled under the sudden pain.

“ _Fuck_ , dude, what was that?”

Cú Chulainn hefted the dictionary. “A warning. Three… two…”

Láeg didn’t stick around to find out whether he’d actually have thrown it once the count reached _one_.

* * *

Library Exiles  
[3 participants, 3 online]

Láeg: _cormac your cousin is a bitch_

Fergus: _must run in the family_

Cormac: _fuck off fergus. what did he do?_

Láeg: _he told me lavender doesn’t work with my complexion_  
Láeg: _he was not gentle about it  
_Láeg: _it was like getting bitten by a puppy_

Fergus: _LMAO_  
Fergus: _he’s right tho  
_Fergus: _lavender looks terrible on you_

Cormac: _… yeah_  
Cormac: _it does  
_Cormac: _sorry_

Láeg: _et tu, brute?_

Cormac: _I honestly always assumed you were aiming for that effect_

Fergus: _this is why you’re single, láeg_

Láeg: _wow I see who he learned it from  
_Láeg: _you’re all bastards_

Fergus: _accept it, the puppy has better fashion sense than you_

Láeg: _oh we are not calling him that_

Cormac: _hell yeah we are. he won’t be a fresher forever_

Láeg: _he is wearing. fleecy green pyjama bottoms_

Fergus: _god I wish that were me_

Láeg: _with a NEON YELLOW WORKOUT TOP  
_Láeg: _UNDER A PURPLE T-SHIRT THAT’S FALLING HALFWAY OFF HIS SHOULDER_

Fergus: _wow that’s a Look  
_Fergus: _do you have a picture?_

Láeg: _of course I don’t have a fucking picture jfc I’m just saying  
_Láeg: _he does NOT have better fashion sense than me_

Cormac: _laeg I’ve seen you wear triple tartan_

Láeg: _it was a STATEMENT_

Cormac: _the statement was that you got dressed in the dark and you own way too much plaid  
_Cormac: _don’t try and lie to me, I was there_

Láeg: _fucking traitors, the lot of you_

Fergus: _I don’t know what you expected, we’ve always been like this_

* * *

Family Conference  
[3 participants, 2 online]  
[Lug: last active 7 hours ago]

Cú Chulainn: _don’t freak out but I kind of have a date tonight and I have no idea what to wear_

Súaltaim: _Ask your father, he’s better at that than me.  
_Súaltaim: _Also you have a date? Already? Is this a good idea?_

Cú Chulainn: _I said not to freak out._

Súaltaim: _I am not freaking out. You would know if I was._

Cú Chulainn: _it’s not really a date, we’re just… meeting up._

Súaltaim: _Where?_

Cú Chulainn: _the theatre, it’s for a dance thing_

Súaltaim: _That’s probably okay, then._

Cú Chulainn: _what were you expecting me to say?! yes dad I’m meeting him in a dodgy back-alley bar where they don’t check ID and we’re gonna get_ super _trashed_

Súaltaim: _Please. They’d never sell alcohol to you, ID or not. You look about twelve._

Cú Chulainn: _wow thanks_

Lug: _Soz, @ wrk, missd ur q. do u hv a suit?_

Cú Chulainn: _dad you have autocorrect and unlimited texts why are you still doing this  
_Cú Chulainn: _also I’m not going in a_ suit _it’s a dance soc event and it’s not even a real date_

Lug: _jst askn_

Cú Chulainn: _hello yes I’d like to buy a vowel_

Súaltaim: _Don’t talk to your father like that._

Cú Chulainn: _screw it, I’m wearing jeans_

Lug: _dnt u dare_

Cú Chulainn: _and a hoodie_

Lug: _u’ll b sngl 4evr_

Cú Chulainn: _I’ll be snuggly forever? yes that’s the idea. hoodies are great_

Lug: _ill fone u_  
Lug: _answr ur fone u brat  
_Lug: _do u wnt hlp or nt_

Lug: _s, he gts it frm u_

Súaltaim: _I’m really not sure he does._


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> whaaaaaat, two chapters in one day?! i know, it's wild. anyway, this one is 90% groupchat shenanigans, this time featuring conall and naoise as well.

Cousin Chat

_Cormac_ created the group.

 _Cormac_ added _Cú Chulainn, Naoise,_ and _Conall_ to the conversation.

Cormac: _So._

Cú Chulainn: _how did you even get my number_

Cormac: _stole láeg_ _’s phone when he wasn_ _’t looking, obviously_

Cú Chulainn: _how did LÁEG get my number_

Cormac: _your dad gave it to him_

Cú Chulainn: _of course he did_

Conall: _yo what_ _’s going on_  
Conall: _why do we need another group chat we already have cells &serpents_

Cormac: _because our darling little baby cousin is all grown up and following in the family tradition  
_Cormac: _who knows, maybe he_ _’ll even graduate without starting another family feud  
_Cormac: _anyway I thought we should keep him in the loop_

Conall: _oh hey Cú  
_Conall: _jsyk signal is shit out here and naoise_ _’s wifi is like. ha. it_ _’s like a snail died, and its corpse is being carried by a group of other snails, and all of those snails have arthritis.  
_Conall: _so I might not be online much_

Naoise: _I was going to say it_ _’s not that bad.  
_Naoise: _But. Yes. It_ _’s pretty slow._

Cú Chulainn: _guys it_ _’s not that I don_ _’t want to be in this group chat or anything but do we have to have this conversation right now_

Cormac: _oh I should have mentioned  
_Cormac: _little Cú is on a date tonight_

Conall: _A DATE!  
_Conall: _okay now the group chat makes sense_

Naoise: _< 3   
_Naoise: _Who with? Do we know them?_

Cú Chulainn: _that_ _’s it, I_ _’m changing my phone number_

Cormac: _don_ _’t be a spoilsport. we_ _’re just happy for you. young love is a beautiful thing._

Cú Chulainn: _it_ _’s NOT EVEN A REAL DATE_

Cormac: _láeg says you_ _’re wearing a SHIRT  
_Cormac: _with BUTTONS_

Cú Chulainn: _láeg is gonna get slapped_

Conall: _a shirt! it must be true love_

Cú Chulainn: _I am leaving this group chat_

Naoise: _That won_ _’t help. They_ _’ll only talk about you behind your back if you do. Trust me, I_ _’ve been there._

Cormac: _yeah naoise_ _’s just happy we have another target now._

Conall: _naoise have you ever noticed how you_ _’re the only one of us whose name doesn_ _’t begin with C_

Naoise: _I had, actually. I feel a little betrayed that you chose to join the alliteration club when you changed yours, Cú._

Cú Chulainn: _that honestly wasn_ _’t deliberate_

 _Cormac_ set _Naoise_ _’s_ nickname to _Cnaoise._

Cormac: _there you go, you_ _’re part of the club  
_Cormac: _but let_ _’s not get distracted. what_ _’s happening, little cú?_

Cú Chulainn: _what_ _’s happening is that I_ _’m turning off my phone_

Conall: _nooooooo_

Cú Chulainn: _because there is a beautiful boy waiting for me about three metres away, and I would rather look at him than talk to you dicks_

Cnaoise: _Aww.  
_Cnaoise: _I can_ _’t even be mad that you called us dicks when it_ _’s in the pursuit of beautiful boys._

Conall: _godspeed, little cú_

Cormac: _he_ is _pretty beautiful_

Cnaoise: _Cormac, you_ _’d better not be stalking them on their date._

Cormac: _obviously I am not stalking them, I_ _’m not fergus_

Conall: _lmao is fergus stalking them for you_

Cormac: _no, but he did manage to find a picture of said boy_ _…_

Cú Chulainn: _he WHAT_

Cormac: _I thought you were turning off your phone_

Cú Chulainn: _I am  
_Cú Chulainn: _then I_ _’m gonna go punch fergus_

Cnaoise: _I support that._

Cormac: _after everything he did for you, cnish._

Cnaoise: _That doesn_ _’t give him a get-out-of-jail-free card when it comes to being a weirdo._

Conall: _yo please change your nick back, this is too confusing_

 _Cormac_ set _Conall_ _’s_ nickname to _Nallnach_

Nallnach: _how is this any better_

Cormac: _it_ _’s at least 20% funnier_

 _Nallnach_ set _Cormac_ _’s_ nickname to _Longest Con._

Longest Con: _is that just a description of my PhD because honestly, mood_

Cnaoise: _We should go, Dee_ _’s calling._

Longest Con: _fair. say hi to her for me?_

Cnaoise: _Will do._

Nallnach: _@Cú Chulainn when you come online we need deets, okay?  
_Nallnach: _like. ALLLLLLL the deets._  
Nallnach: _please  
_Nallnach: _cnish and dee are being cutesy like all the time, I need a break from The Straights  
_Nallnach: _so I_ _’m gonna need to know EVERYTHING_

* * *

Láeg really wasn’t stalking them.

He hadn’t even realised the route to the library would take him past the theatre. He rarely went that way this late at night, and there weren’t many daytime performances, so it didn’t occur to him that he’d be emerging with an armful of books just as theatregoers spilled out through the front doors and onto the patio outside, making the most of the mild autumn evening to talk about the show while they waited for friends who’d been performing to emerge from backstage.

And he wasn’t looking for Cú Chulainn among the crowd. He was just trying to find the best way past without having to squeeze through any of the large groups of people.

But he had to admit that he slowed his pace when he caught sight of the boy. He was deep in conversation, eyes bright, expression earnest, graceful dancer’s hands gesturing emphatically as though trying to catch words out of thin air. With him was a young man Láeg recognised from the picture Fergus had sent – and he _was_ a young man, really, or at least not as baby-faced as Cú Chulainn. He had the faintest shadow of a pale beard around his jaw, his long light hair tied in a loose ponytail with messy strands hanging down to frame his face. His posture was as upright as Cú Chulainn's, and he had the same slightly turned-out feet, even when relaxed – ballet training clearly won out. A small smile played around his lips as he listened to the boy talk.

Two things were immediately apparent. One: he was extremely cute. Two: he was definitely, _definitely_ into Cú Chulainn.

Láeg smiled to himself and continued on his way. He suspected his flatmate wouldn’t be home for a while.

* * *

Cousin Chat

Cú Chulainn: _there are no_ _‘deets_ _’ to tell. I don_ _’t get what the big deal is._

Nallnach: _you could start with his name_

Longest Con: _he_ _’s called ferdia._

Cú Chulainn: _right, well, we_ _’re all caught up._

Longest Con: _you_ _’ll tell láeg eventually and he_ _’ll tell me and I_ _’ll tell the others so you may as well just cut out the middleman and tell us how it went_

Cnaoise: _He doesn_ _’t have to tell us anything if he doesn_ _’t want to._

Cú Chulainn: _THANK YOU, naoise._

Nallnach: _uhhh yes you do_

Cú Chulainn: _we went to see a show that some people from the dance soc were doing, because our pas de deux teacher said it would be a useful thing for us all to go to if we wanted to understand partner work in a contemporary context, and since we were both going anyway, it made sense to meet up once we were there. that_ _’s all there was to it._

Longest Con: _oh so you left immediately after the show_

Cú Chulainn: _obviously we discussed the show a bit  
_Cú Chulainn: _the choreography was super interesting, especially how they used gender. the way they subverted expectations by having the smaller dancer lift the taller one at several key moments in the piece was fascinating_

Longest Con: _I have to admit I don_ _’t care  
_Longest Con: _I came to one of your competitions and that was enough for a lifetime  
_Longest Con: _but I_ _’m glad you enjoyed it anyway_

Nallnach: _please tell me you at least went for a drink afterwards_

Cú Chulainn: _I_ _’m seventeen._

Nallnach: _YOU CAN DRINK LEMONADE_

Cú Chulainn: _he was meeting some friends. we didn_ _’t go on anywhere._

Nallnach: _I am so profoundly disappointed right now. please tell me there were at least some longing glances. did you touch hands. I_ _’m not even gonna ask if you kissed because I already know you_ _’re going to say no but you_ _’ve got to give me SOMETHING_

Cú Chulainn: _it wouldn_ _’t be any of your business anyway_

Nallnach: _i am calling your dads and telling them their son is a PRUDE and a KILLJOY_

Cnaoise: _No, you_ _’re not. The signal out here definitely isn_ _’t strong enough for that._

Nallnach: _KILLJOYS, KILLJOYS EVERYWHERE._

Cnaoise: _The real question is, are you going to see him again?_

Cú Chulainn: _we have class together on tuesday_

Longest Con: _that_ _’s not what he meant and you know it_

Cú Chulainn: …  
Cú Chulainn: _so there_ _’s this new film out about Nureyev_

Nallnach: _PRAISE BE TO WHATEVER GODS THERE MIGHT BE OUT THERE WATCHING OVER THIS BABY GAY_

Cú Chulainn: _I_ _’m bi_

Nallnach: _I_ _’m pretty sure it_ _’s the same gods  
_Nallnach: _also you_ _’re such a ballet nerd, and I kind of adore it???_

Cnaoise: _I think it_ _’s sweet_

Nallnach: _that_ _’s because you_ _’re insufferable_

Cnaoise: _Dude, you_ _’re in my house right now._

Nallnach: _brb gotta get beat up by an folk singer, how terrible_

Cnaoise: _… you know I do martial arts, right?_

Longest Con: _guys, focus. and also don_ _’t beat each other up.  
_Longest Con: _are you actually going to go and see the film together, Cú?_

Cú Chulainn: _yes?_

Nallnach: _uh oh, the question mark of ominous uncertainty. don_ _’t tell me you left it open-ended._

Cú Chulainn: _he said he_ _’d call me_

Longest Con: _hmmm._

Nallnach: _HMMMMM._

Cnaoise: _I_ _’m sure he will._

 _Longest Con_ set _Cú Chulainn_ _’s_ nickname to _Puppy._

Puppy: _why, cormac._

Longest Con: _PUPPY LOVE  
_Nallnach: _PUPPY LOVE_

Puppy: _oh gods who watch over baby gays and maybe bi people also  
_Puppy: _what did I do to deserve this many cousins  
_Puppy: _what sacrifice do you demand of me before you_ _’ll free me from them_

Cnaoise: _If you need me to sacrifice Conall for you, I can do that._

Nallnach: _wow cnish  
_Nallnach: _does dee know you_ _’re this bloodthirsty_

Cnaoise: _That_ _’s why she loves me :)_

Puppy: _yeah I might take you up on that, naoise_

Cnaoise: _Any time :) :) :)_

Longest Con: _did he eat all your food again cnish_

Cnaoise: _Yup._

Nallnach: _objection  
_Nallnach: _I have been SLANDERED  
_Nallnach: _today I dug up a POTATO. I am CONTRIBUTING TO THIS HOUSEHOLD._

Cnaoise: _Still a while to go before we make a farmer of you._

Longest Con: _you have a farm out there?_

Cnaoise: _The beginnings of one, yeah._

Puppy: _wow yes let_ _’s focus on naoise becoming a farmer rather than my love life, that sounds like a great idea, I_ _’m here for this_

Cnaoise: _And after I offered to do a blood sacrifice for you, Cú. No gratitude._

Longest Con: _that_ _’s gen Z for you  
_Longest Con: _no respect for their elders_

Nallnach: _kids these days. it_ _’s shocking._

Cnaoise: _I_ _’m surprised your dads didn_ _’t bring you up with better manners._

Puppy: _I feel like I_ _’m being ganged up on  
_Puppy: _I don_ _’t like it_

 _Puppy_ added _Fergus_ to the conversation.

Longest Con: _you can_ _’t do that, Fergus isn_ _’t a cousin_

Fergus: _ooh are we mocking Cú for being a child? NICE_

Longest Con: _nvm, he can stay_

Puppy: _wait no  
_Puppy: _fergus, why._

Fergus: _sorry kid, but when you get to our age, you_ _’ll know it_ _’s every man for himself in the group chat_

Puppy: _I hate all of you._

Fergus: _so tell me more about Ferdia_

[seen by 3]


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> cú chulainn continues to be adorable; emer gets namedropped.

Cú Chulainn had been sitting at the kitchen table for at least half an hour. Not that Láeg was timing him, but… well, he’d been planning to go and do some more procrastibaking, this time for a cake stall he’d somehow got roped into helping with, but he’d figured he should wait for his flatmate to finish his breakfast. Except it didn’t look like he was actually _eating_. He was just kind of… sitting there. Occasionally he scrolled through his phone, but then he’d put it face-down and go back to staring in the middle distance. Which meant it was bad, if not even Twitter could keep his interest.

They hadn’t had a chance to talk the night before. To _debrief_. Cormac’s messages suggested he’d been tormenting his cousin, and it seemed cruel to question him further, so Láeg had left it to Cú Chulainn to start the conversation. He hadn’t, and now it seemed weird to bring it up.

Láeg glanced around his room for an excuse to go into the kitchen. Well, there were at least five mugs in there, waiting to be washed up. He’d never been so glad to do the tea drinker’s walk of shame.

Five mugs were duly deposited in the sink. “So,” he pronounced. Cú Chulainn had looked up briefly when Láeg entered, but now he’d gone back to his aimless staring. “What’s got into you?”

“Nothing.”

“Your cousin is a better liar than you.” Láeg turned on the hot tap and waited for the water to warm up. It seemed to take an extraordinarily long time for it to become anything other than apathetically room temperature. “Give me your phone.”

“What? No,” said Cú Chulainn, reaching to grab his phone, but Láeg had already snatched it up from the table. It was unlocked, open to the browser. Cinema listings, by the looks of things, though not for the local multiscreen – some weird artsy theatre a few miles away. Láeg closed that and opened up the call history. Nothing. Three missed calls from _Father Person_ and one from _Dad_ , but that was it.

Well, that explained a lot.

Láeg folded his arms. “He hasn’t called you yet because it’s ten thirty on a Saturday morning and he went out with his friends after your date last night.”

“Who says I’m waiting for him to call me?”

“Your expression.”

Cú Chulainn narrowed his eyes. “How do _you_ know he went out with his friends?”

“You told Cormac he was meeting people and that’s why you didn’t go on anywhere, and Cormac told me.”

“The fact that you talk to Cormac about me is going to get very old, very fast.”

“Would you rather I interrogate you as well? I got the impression you’d had enough of a grilling.” The phone pinged in his hand. _Cousin Chat_ – several unread notifications. He raised his eyebrow: “You’re ignoring them?”

“They were mocking me.”

Another ping. _Emer_. Interesting. “Who’s Emer?”

“She’s the one who made me join the dance soc. Give me my phone back.”

“Not until you promise to stop moping.” Another ping. Emer again.

“I’m not moping. Give it back.”

“You’re hoping to go to the cinema with Ferdia?”

“So what if I am?” Cú Chulainn made a lunge for the phone, but Láeg spun out of reach, holding it above his head.

“Just wondering why you’re not going to the Odeon. It’s nearer.”

“They’re not showing the Nureyev film.” His flatmate eyed him, as though planning a tactical manoeuvre to retrieve the phone. “But it depends whether or not he can drive, because there aren’t any buses that go there and it’s too far to walk.”

Láeg meant to say, _You could get a taxi._ What came out was, “I can drive.”

Cú Chulainn’s calculating look softened into momentary confusion. “What?”

He coughed. “I can drive,” he repeated. “If you need a lift.”

“You’re offering to give me a lift to my date? Why?”

 _Asking myself the same question right now,_ thought Láeg. “Taxis round here are kind of sketchy,” he said instead, “and you’re, like… a child. Feels irresponsible not to.”

“And there I thought for a second you were trying to be nice.”

“Yeah, and it was uncomfortable for both of us. The offer stands, nonetheless.” Láeg handed him back his phone. “Seriously, though, he’s probably still asleep. It’s Saturday. Depending who his friends are, he probably got in pretty late. I wouldn’t sweat it.”

“I’m not _sweating it_.”

“If you say so.” He began washing up his mugs, shoving a few other bits of crockery into the sink while he was about it. “Do you want to talk about last night? I assume it went well, if you’re planning to meet up again.”

Maybe it was easier to talk to Láeg’s back, because Cú Chulainn said, “It did. It was… nice.” He drummed his fingers on the table. “The show was good. I can see why Scáthach wanted us to go to it, from the point of view of understanding different approaches to partner work.”

“Scáthach’s your… dance teacher?”

“Yeah.”

“It looked like a pretty weird production from the posters I saw around campus.”

“It was. Very… experimental. But in a way that’s actually interesting, not trying to be edgy just for the sake of it. I liked how they approached gender in their choreography, and subverted the audience’s expectations of partnering.”

Láeg rinsed his mug free of suds and upturned it on the draining rack. “Did Ferdia enjoy it?”

His flatmate was silent for a long moment, as though only happy to talk about the date on the condition they weren’t _actually_ talking about the date part of that equation. “Yeah,” he said finally. “I think so, anyway. We talked about it a bit afterwards, but I… I might’ve got a bit carried away.”

“Didn’t let him get a word in edgeways?”

“Something like that.”

That had been the impression Láeg had got from the brief vignette he’d seen of the two of them outside the theatre, too, but it hadn’t looked like Ferdia had a problem with listening to Cú Chulainn talk. “If he’s not down with that, he won’t like you anyway,” he said lightly. “You always talk too much.”

He turned just in time to duck the small missile Cú Chulainn threw at him. It was only a box of paracetamol, he realised once the immediate danger had passed, but there hadn’t really been time to assess the threat level. The kid’s aim was worryingly good.

His flatmate’s phone pinged again. “Emer again?” he guessed. “Or _Cousin Chat_?”

“Not that it’s any of your business, but it’s Emer.”

“What does she want?”

“Much the same as you do. To talk about last night.” Cú Chulainn frowned. “I’m not sure why everyone is so invested in my love life.”

“She’s the reason you guys met,” said Láeg. “She’s probably enjoying playing cupid.”

“Hmm.” He turned his phone facedown without replying to the message.

Turning his attention back to the washing up, Láeg asked, “Out of interest, which of your dads is saved in your phone as _Father Person_ , and why are you ignoring his calls?”

Cú Chulainn’s mouth quirked. “The one you haven’t met. And I was ignoring him because I made the mistake of asking for fashion advice the other night and he took it upon himself to try and give it to me. Unfortunately, he has never been casual about anything in his entire life, and seems to think a suit is appropriate clothing for a first date.”

“Ah. He’s the one with like a zillion degrees, right?”

“That’s him.”  

“ _Father Person_ is gay polytheist academia dad. Got it.” Mentally, he promised himself that next time he got his hands on his flatmate’s phone, he’d update that contact accordingly.

“ _That’s_ how you’re classifying him?” said Cú Chulainn. “Wait, what do you call my other dad?”

“Súaltaim,” said Láeg promptly. “I don’t know Gay Polytheist Academia Dad’s name. I’m making do with the information I’ve got.”

The boy rolled his eyes. “His name is Lug.”

He considered this. “Yeah, I’m gonna keep calling him Gay Polytheist Academia Dad.”

“I feel like the _gay_ part is superfluous when we’re talking about my two fathers.”

“Polytheist Academia Dad. PAD for short. Paddy!”

“You could just call him by his name.”

“Nah, that would be boring.” Láeg finished washing the handful of teaspoons he’d brought back from his room and gathered them all up, dumping them in the cutlery tray of the drainer. He flicked soap bubbles off his hands in Cú Chulainn’s direction, and had the satisfaction of watching his flatmate try – and fail – to dodge them. “Do you have any plans for this morning that don’t involve sitting here pretending you’re not just waiting for Ferdia to call you, or do I have to call Cormac and get him to come over and torment you in person?”

Cú Chulainn bit his lip. “Well, technically I still have this translation to do, but… I’ve been thinking more about what you said. About changing subjects.”

“Yeah?”

“I just don’t know what I’d do instead. I _thought_ I’d like theology. What if I pick something else and then find I hate it just as much?”

“Have you talked to your tutor yet?”

“No. I didn’t want to say anything until I was more definite about actually switching.”

“You should probably still talk to them.” Láeg dried his hands. “I don’t have a lot to suggest. You could have a look through the prospectus, see if anything catches your eye, then talk to people from those subjects about what it’s actually like. Any ideas so far?”

“History, maybe… or something literature-based. I’m not sure if I want to do English though.”

“Classics?”

“I’m switching subjects to _escape_ from Greek translation, Láeg.”

“Right.” Láeg hunted for other ideas. “Comparative Lit? Conall took some of their modules, he might be able to talk to you about it.”

“Maybe.” Cú Chulainn sighed. “So I guess that’s my plan for this morning, anyway.”

“Better than moping.”

“I am _not—_ ” Unmistakeably, Cú Chulainn’s phone began to ring. They both stared at it for several seconds before he actually picked it up.

“Is it him?” said Láeg.

Cú Chulainn looked at the screen, suddenly pale. “Yep,” he said. “Talk to you later. I gotta go.” He was halfway out of the kitchen already, swiping to accept the call even as he kicked the doorstop aside and let the door swing shut, but Láeg still heard the breathy, hopeful way he said, “Hello?”

* * *

Cells & Serpents

Láeg: _ah, young love. it almost makes an old cynic like me believe in romance again._

Conall: _you’re not a cynic, láeg, you’re just single_

Cormac: _^^^_

Láeg: _WOW._

Naoise: _I presume this means Cú Chulainn is being adorable? He’s been ignoring our messages all morning._

Fergus: _tbf we probably deserved it_

Láeg: _fergus why are YOU in cousin chat, you’re not related to them  
_Láeg: _wait have you been related to them this whole time  
_Láeg: _I mean at this point I wouldn’t even be surprised_

Cormac: _nah the puppy added him to act as backup_

Conall: _it backfired. it was hilarious._

Láeg: _you’re so mean to him. anyway yes @naoise he IS being adorable_

Naoise: _Oh good_

Conall: _deets, pls_

Láeg: _only if you don’t tell him I told you_

Fergus: _what do you take us for?_

Láeg: _traitors and opportunists_

Fergus: _…  
_Fergus: _yeah, you know what, that’s fair_

Cormac: _we won’t tell him, now SPILL ALREADY_


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> láeg and cú chulainn's neighbours are having a party, and it's loud; conall gives terrible advice. featuring emer, and also láeg's car.

It was barely 3pm when the noise started.

Láeg had finished baking everything he had the ingredients to bake and, faced with empty cupboards and a mountain of washing up, had been forced to confront the reality of his deadlines. Even the washing up, which he’d normally have put off as long as possible, didn’t delay it as long as he’d hoped/feared. He was just placing his large mixing bowl on the draining rack when the first thumping beats vibrated through the floor, causing it to slip from his hands and narrowly avoid smashing against the hard counter before he recovered and caught it.

“For fuck’s sake,” he said aloud, and glanced at the clock. What a stupid time of day to have a party. Too early to be reasonable – and for him to march over there and complain that they were keeping him up all night. Perfectly placed to prevent anyone from getting any work done, while avoiding official sanctions on late-night noise.

But even if he couldn’t justify an official complaint, he could still moan about it.

He dried his hands and grabbed his phone, hesitating over which chat to message. On the one hand, it wasn’t like _Cells & Serpents_ could do anything about it, given what proportion of the group wasn’t even in the _country_. And he already knew what Conall would say. On the other hand, he’d missed talking to Naoise during his long silence, and _Library Exiles_ didn’t have anything else to recommend it, given that the only member of _both_ chats to be local enough to help was Cormac.

 _Cells & Serpents_ it was.

Láeg: _hypothetically speaking if your neighbours were having a loud party at 3pm on a Saturday while you’re trying to avoid doing your work, what would you do about it_

There was a moment’s pause while several “…” bubbles popped up. Then three messages simultaneously:

Conall: _kill them_

Fergus: _ask if you can come to the party_

Cormac: _buy some earplugs_

Nothing from Naoise; the chat log said he’d been offline for a few hours. But Conall’s response was predictable – as were the others, really. If he’d sat down and thought, “What would my friends do about this?” he was fairly sure he’d have come up with the same answers. Maybe Cormac’s was _marginally_ more sensible than he’d have expected, but that probably meant he had low expectations.

Láeg: _thanks that doesn’t help at all_

Conall: _do you need help with the murdering?_

Láeg: _I am not going to murder my neighbours for party-related crimes._

Conall sent a shrugging emoji. _if you’re not going to take my very good advice I don’t know why you asked._

The status dot next to Naoise’s name turned green, and a moment later, his contribution came through. _You could decamp to the library?_

Fergus: _your solution to everything is to leave_

Láeg: _fergus I love you and everything but you do realise how ironic that is coming from you, right?_

Fergus: _I didn’t say it was a bad thing…_

The conversation deteriorated into bickering, while the noise outside intensified. Láeg found his attention drifting as his skull buzzed under the onslaught. He couldn’t imagine how loud it must be from the flat opposite. How did any of them _bear_ it? It made Cú Chulainn seem like a model flatmate; his music was rarely audible when his door was shut, and the one time it had reached higher volumes, Láeg had been _reasonably_ sure it was Stravinsky.

He’d learned a lot about himself in the past couple of weeks, mainly that he’d somehow absorbed more ballet knowledge than he would have admitted to if you’d asked him a month ago. It was hard to say where it had come from. Some of the musical knowledge, at least, had probably come from Naoise – it had always seemed vaguely ironic that the catalyst of the Great Politics Department Schism had been a music student, even if it was because Dee was doing International Relations. He was into dance music, of all and any varieties. Láeg hadn’t even realised he was listening to those musical monologues, but something had obviously sunk in.

He looked back at his phone.

Cormac: _you could call security if it’s REALLY obnoxious. or you could just go over there and ask them to turn the music down. they might not realise you can hear it_

Láeg: _the building is literally vibrating right now  
_Láeg: _they’d have to be idiots not to realise_

But Cormac was right. He could just go over there and ask them to keep it down. He just didn’t want to. It didn’t seem like a good way to keep relations with the neighbours friendly – although given that they’d literally never had a conversation, maybe that was a lost cause. It seemed like a shitty way to introduce himself, though. “Hey, I’m Láeg, can you shut the fuck up?” Maybe not.

Cú Chulainn wandered into the kitchen, looking disgruntled. “What the fuck is that.” It wasn’t a question, and Láeg assumed he was talking about the noise rather than Láeg’s cakes, which looked fabulous, thank you very much.

“Neighbours having a party again, apparently.”

“Didn’t they have a party like… three days ago. Four days. I don’t know.”

“Yep.”

“Dickheads.” Other than look utterly fed up about the noise, Cú Chulainn was looking a lot more cheerful than earlier in the day. He hadn’t reappeared since he shut himself in his room to take Ferdia’s call – or rather, he’d slipped into the kitchen to grab lunch while Láeg was in the loo, and he had a suspicion his flatmate had planned that deliberately to avoid interrogation. Since then, his door had been firmly shut. “You should go over there and tell them to keep it down.”

“Why me?”

“Because you’re older than me, so it’s your responsibility.”

“On the other hand,” said Láeg, “you’re young and cute and if you give them puppy-dog eyes maybe they’ll feel sorry for you and do what you ask.”

“As if.”

“It’s worth a try.”

“Or… neither of us could go, and we could just sit here and complain about it.”

“Yeah, that was more or less my plan.”

Cú Chulainn glanced out of the window. “God, they’ve invited half the campus. Or else there’s a large stream of people converging on our building for unrelated reasons, but that seems unlikely.”

Láeg wandered over to look. It was true, there were a _lot_ more people on their street than usual. And several taxis pulling up. And a truly worrying number of bottles being delivered by a Tesco van parked on the kerb outside.

“It might be time for evasive manoeuvres,” he said.

“I’m not spending the entire evening in the library,” said Cú Chulainn.

Láeg already had his phone in his hand. “That wasn’t my plan,” he said, listening to the phone dial, and then ring, and then connect. “Hey, Cormac,” he began, without waiting for a greeting. “Can we come over before my innards turn to jelly due to frankly unsafe decibel levels? I can bring…” He eyed his afternoon’s baking and made an executive decision about what the cake sale needed – and what it didn’t. “I can bring a chocolate layer cake.”

Cormac was silent for a moment, apparently considering this. Then he said, “Who’s ‘we’?”

“Me and Cú Chulainn.” He wasn’t sure if that would be a pro or a con from Cormac’s perspective. Apparently Cormac didn’t either, because he took a long time making up his mind.

Finally, he said, “Sure, whatever, it’s not like I’m doing anything anyway. How late do you reckon they’ll go on? Is this a crashing on the couch kind of situation? Because I only have one sofa, so the puppy will have to sleep on the floor.”

“No idea, but we’ll work it out. You are saving our sanity right now.”

“I’m in it for the cake.”

“I know you are.”

“And for the opportunity to mock little Cú in person.”

“I know that too.”

Cormac laughed. “Yeah,” he said, “but does he?”

* * *

In the half hour it took for them to gather their things and find a box for the cake, the flat opposite had filled up with people who spilled out into the hallway. More were arriving; the stairwell was filled with them, and they had to squeeze their way past. Outside the building there was a little more space to move, but it seemed like the crowds were infinite nonetheless. Láeg saw one or two people he recognised. So, it seemed, did Cú Chulainn.

“Hey, Emer,” he said, coming to a halt in front of one of the girls. “What are _you_ doing here?”

“Oh hey, Cú,” she said. “You mean the party?”

“You mean the rules-breaking fire hazard?” said Láeg, not quite as quietly as he’d meant to.

She grinned at him. “You must be the flatmate. I’m Emer. You’re not joining us?”

“Láeg values his eardrums too much for that,” said Cú Chulainn, “and I value his cake, so we’re decamping. But yeah, I meant the party. Who’s throwing it?”

“Honestly not even sure,” she said. “Some guy invited me, and I’m pretty sure it was an attempt at asking me out, but it failed. Figured I’d check out the party anyway, since it seems like everyone’s going. Half the dance soc’s on their way – you didn’t see?”

“See what?”

“The group chat. It’s been going mad.”

Cú Chulainn shook his head. “I’m not in the dance soc group chat.”

Emer’s mouth dropped open. “You’re _what_? Oh, right, yeah, of course. You weren’t at the social in freshers’ week, so they must’ve forgotten to add you. When are you eighteen, anyway?”

“Next year.”

“You need a fake ID, like, _yesterday_.”

“As if anyone would believe him,” said Láeg. He wasn’t trying to be cruel; if anything it was a defence of his flatmate’s lack of interest in trying to sneak into bars, an easy way out of the obligation. Cú Chulainn’s expression was inscrutable, though, so it was hard to tell whether that was what he’d taken from it.

“I’ll add you. Tonight. Maybe tomorrow, depending how much I drink. You’re missing out.” Then she added, “You’re not the only one skipping out on this one, though. Ferdia’s not going either.”

“He’s not?” said Cú Chulainn, and his voice had the tone of somebody clutching at a lifeline. Most likely he’d been wondering why Ferdia hadn’t mentioned it on the phone, afraid to mention this to Láeg in case it sounded needy. Bless him.

“Nope. Wouldn’t say why, though.” One of Emer’s friends called to her from the entrance to the building and she glanced round, “Coming!” Then to Cú Chulainn and Láeg: “Well, enjoy your cake and quiet. I’d say you’re missing out, but I have literally no idea what to expect from this, and it might be terrible, so I guess we’ll have to wait and see.”

She’d already turned and walked away when Cú Chulainn called out to her: “Emer?” When she turned, he said, “We live in the flat opposite. Make sure they don’t break down our door and trash the place, will you?”

Her smile was luminous and genuine. Láeg began to see how she’d caught Cú Chulainn’s attention and convinced him to join the dance soc. “I’ll do my best,” she said, saluting, and went to join her friends.

From there it wasn’t far to Láeg’s car, which was… well, frankly, it was a piece of shit, at least from the outside. But it ran, and it ran well. He hit faster speeds in this than Conall ever did on that flashy motorbike he was so proud of, even if it needed some serious polishing.

“ _This_ is your car?” said Cú Chulainn, in a way that suggested Láeg’s offer to give him a lift to his date now seemed less like an act of kindness, and more like a proposed humiliation.

“Well, if you don’t like it,” said Láeg, swinging himself down into the driver’s seat, “you can walk.”


	11. Chapter 11

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> slightly shorter than some of the previous ones, but it's aaaallll proper narration, no group chats. honestly not sure if that's a pro or a con at this point but there are some nice descriptions of rain. láeg and ferdia meet for the first time.

As they drove across town towards Cormac’s flat, it began to rain. At first it was drizzle, speckling the dirty windscreen of Láeg’s car with delicate stipples hardly worth swiping aside with the windscreen wipers. Then the sky darkened, heavy clouds sweeping in to push aside any last scraps of blue sky, and the rain intensified. Fat, insistent droplets pounded the roof and windows, straining the capacity of Láeg’s feeble front wipers and defeating the broken back one entirely. It probably would have been better to get it fixed last month, instead of leaving it as it was, snapped off halfway up the shaft and virtually useless for anything other than periodically holding flyers in place when the student theatre groups became too zealous in their advertising.

The charcoal sky lent the afternoon something of the night, and they both squinted out at the road ahead. It seemed overkill to turn on the headlights at this time of day, though a few other drivers had, and the beams of their lights caught the raindrops and turned them momentarily to molten silver as they scattered.

It was the kind of weather that was simultaneously beautiful and utterly miserable. Five minutes outside would crush your spirits, right after it filled your shoes with water. The drains, blocked with autumn leaves and unprepared for the onslaught, were beginning to overflow, and water cascaded across the road and pavements in sheets.

“Wouldn’t want to be out in this,” said Láeg, thinking of their neighbours’ party guests in their unsuitable shoes.

“Glad we didn’t walk,” agreed Cú Chulainn – and then, as though their words were prophetic, they saw a slender figure on the pavement, shoulders hunched against the rain. The pedestrian wasn’t dressed for the weather, and was paying for it. 

Despite the suddenness of the rain, a large puddle had already formed in the road. Láeg slowed down as they passed, trying not to send the water flooding over the pavement to drench the sorry-looking figure, when Cú Chulainn grabbed his arm so suddenly he almost sent the car swerving off the road. 

“It’s Ferdia,” he said, apparently without even noticing that he’d almost killed them both. “Stop the car, it’s Ferdia.” 

Láeg glanced up at the rearview mirror. It was hard to tell given the torrential downpour limiting his vision, but the soaked person did look like they could plausibly be the young man he’d seen at the theatre the day before, and he trusted Cú Chulainn to recognise him. He slowed to a halt, but his passenger made no move to get out. “Well?” he said after a few moments. “Ask him if he wants a lift.” 

It looked like Cú Chulainn hadn’t thought this far ahead. He sat frozen in the passenger seat. “Well, I mean, I don’t know—” 

Láeg leaned over and rolled down his window. “Hey, Ferdia!” he called, over the sound of thundering rain. The figure looked up, confused, and the overcast sky lit the angles of his face. Yep, definitely the same person. “Need a lift?” 

The young man walked hesitantly towards the car, then stopped. “I don’t – do we know each other?” 

Cú Chulainn peered out of the window, finally. “It’s me,” he said. 

“Oh.” Recognition dawned, and apparently having decided they weren’t axe-murderers who intended to kill him if he got into their car, Ferdia approached. He walked like a dancer, even soaked, but hesitated again with his hand on the handle of the back door. “I’m going to get your car all wet.” 

“It’s had worse,” said Láeg. “Get in, before the heavens drown you.” 

Ferdia climbed in without further argument. “Thanks,” he said. “The rain caught me out.” 

Láeg made no move to drive off. “Where are you headed? We’ll drop you off.” 

“Um.” He ran his fingers through his drenched hair, untangling some of the knots. “Embarrassingly, kind of... nowhere? I figured I’d find a café, or something. My flatmates are being dicks, and I needed to get out of the house. I didn’t have a plan.” 

“A spontaneous walk amidst a downpour. Brave of you. Ridiculous, too, but...” He smiled, making sure Ferdia could see him in the rearview and know that he meant it well. 

“It wasn’t raining when I left,” he answered. “And normally I’d check the weather, but I kind of... left in a hurry.” 

“Stormed out?” A burst of thunder drummed across the sky. “Literally.” 

“Ha. Something like that.”

Láeg glanced at Cú Chulainn, but his flatmate didn’t seem to notice the question in his face. He was fidgeting, tangling his fingers together and pulling on the seat belt, letting it fall back into place with swift, jerky movements. 

Right. Well. He’d be no use at all. He was willing to bet that in a studio, or on a stage, Cú Chulainn was all grace and power. But here he was like a swan on land, wrongfooted and uncertain. 

“I’m Láeg,” he said, belatedly realising he’d never introduced himself. “We haven’t actually met. I’m Cú Chulainn’s flatmate.”

“Ah, right, yeah.” The last lingering confusion on Ferdia’s face cleared. “He mentioned you.”

 _That_ wasn’t ominous at all. Láeg elected to ignore it, rather than ask what the boy might’ve said about him. “We’re headed over to his cousin’s place to escape for the evening.” He didn’t look at his flatmate as he said, “You could come with us,” but he heard the small, surprised squeak that escaped him. “There’s cake,” he added.

Ferdia paused. “Oh,” he said finally, as though weighing this up. 

“You don’t have to,” said Cú Chulainn, very quickly. The words ran together like train carriages shunting up against each other following a collision: _youdonthaveto_. It was hard to know whether he wanted Ferdia to decline the offer. “Like, no pressure. We can just drop you off. But if you wanted to. I mean. Láeg does make good cakes. But Cormac is... well. He’ll. I don’t know. He might be weird about it.” 

“I wouldn’t want to intrude,” said Ferdia carefully. 

“What he means,” said Láeg, pulling out into the road again now that it seemed reasonably clear that he wouldn’t be drastically altering his route, “is that Cormac is far too invested in his baby cousin’s life, and will absolutely attempt to embarrass him. He may also ask you a lot of questions. Given that you’ve known Cú for, like, five days?, that might be more intense than you’re ready for.” 

Ferdia considered this, and while he was thinking, Cú Chulainn said, “Láeg, you’ve never called me ‘Cú’ before.”

“Yeah, well, count yourself lucky. The rest of the group chat are now calling you ‘the puppy’.” He glanced up at his mirror just in time to see Ferdia smile in the back seat, although he tried to hide his amusement.

“I know,” said Cú Chulainn darkly. “They do it to my face, too.” 

Cruising to a stop at a red light, Láeg said, “Jokes aside, if you don’t like being called Cú, I won’t do it again.” 

“No, it’s... it’s fine. I was just surprised.” And that was clearly an easier shock to deal with than the one that involved Ferdia sitting in the car with them, possibly about to join them at Cormac’s flat. 

As if mulling over a matter of great import, Ferdia said, “You mentioned cake?” 

“I might have been procrastibaking,” Láeg admitted. “It’s a chocolate layer cake. Of course, as a dancer I don’t know if you...”

“I eat cake.” 

“Should’ve guessed that from the amount Cú puts away. I don’t know where it goes.”

“Hollow legs,” said Ferdia. “That’s what my mother used to say.” 

“That would explain it,” Láeg agreed. 

Cú Chulainn made a strangled sound. “I’m right here,” he said. 

“And yet I am definitely carrying this conversation,” said Láeg mildly. If the two of them hadn’t met at dance, he surmised, they’d never have got anywhere. Apparently nonverbal communication was all Cú Chulainn was capable of at present. “So you’ll join us, then, Ferdia?” 

“I guess so, if you really don’t mind. But shouldn’t you ask... um, Cormac, was it?” 

Secretly, Láeg suspected it would make Cormac’s day to have the focus of Cú Chulainn’s adoration in his flat, if only for the fodder it would give him later. But he said, “Well, we can call him and ask, but I doubt he’ll have an issue with it. Cú, can you do that?” 

His passenger seemed relieved to have been given something to do. He took out his phone and called Cormac, placing it on speaker and putting it on the dashboard while it rang. “Hey, Cormac.”

“Hey, puppy,” said his cousin. “I don’t suppose this means you’re cancelling on me? Because I’ve planned my afternoon around cake now, and I would be devastated to discover I have to obtain it by some other means. Possibly nefarious ones. And you don’t want to drive me to crime.” 

“Not cancelling. We’re on our way. We’re, uh, bringing a stray, I hope that’s okay.” He was trying so hard to sound casual that it was almost adorable. 

“Oh, are you?” said Cormac. “Well, there’s a per-person cake levy, so you’d better—”

“It’s Ferdia,” interrupted Láeg.

Cormac fell silent. “Well.” 

In the back seat, Ferdia shifted uncomfortably. “Hi?” he said. 

“Is that him?” asked Cormac. 

“That’s him,” said Cú Chulainn. 

“Hmm.” Cormac was silent for a moment. “Well, then. This will be interesting.” Láeg could almost see that wicked smile he sometimes had. It wasn’t exactly sly, but it was sly’s cousin at least, an acquaintance of cunning. “In that case, I look forward to seeing you. Fucking awful weather, isn’t it?” 

“Miserable,” agreed Ferdia, a little unexpectedly. 

“That tone suggests first-hand experience,” said Cormac astutely. “Will you be needing a towel, Ferdia-the-stray?” 

“A towel would be greatly appreciated.” 

“Right. One towel coming up.” It sounded like Cormac was about to hang up, until he said, “But Láeg? That had better be good cake.”

“Well, I made it,” said Láeg. “So it’s a GREAT cake.” 

“You say that like we don’t remember the Great Scone Incident of second year.” 

“Cú,” said Láeg, “please hang up on your cousin.”

“Or that time you were making gingerbread, and you put the dough in the fridge, and then forgot—”

“Like, now would be good.”

“—to take it out and we found it a week later and—”

Láeg reached out and ended the call before Cú Chulainn could stop him. “Or I could just do it myself,” he said, and put his flatmate’s phone into his pocket.

In the back seat, Ferdia chuckled. “Yeah, this is gonna be way more fun than exiling myself to a café all evening.” 


	12. Chapter 12

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> We finally learn (some of) what went down with Naoise and Dee last year. There's considerably less murder than in the real Longes mac nUislenn.

Cormac’s flat was a basement.

An estate agent would have described it as a _spacious lower ground floor studio_ , and they wouldn’t have been lying, exactly. It wasn’t particularly small, and it wasn’t _completely_ below ground, either; enough of it was at street level to have a few small, high windows letting in dribbles of light. And rain. There was definitely some rain coming in.

But it was the kind of open-plan living arrangement that Láeg, personally, would have hated. Sure, so there was enough space for a fairly large sofa which doubled to partition the bedroom area off from the living space, and you weren’t practically living in your own kitchen the way you might in some studios he’d seen advertised, but there was a distinct lack of, well, wall. And privacy. He’d never planned to stay the night there, and with Ferdia in tow that wouldn’t have been practical anyway, but it wouldn’t have worked regardless.

Cormac’s laptop was open on the coffee table, plugged in to a small pair of speakers. A folky track was playing, all fiddly guitar and complicated, alliterative lyrics. Láeg quite liked it. 

Ferdia hung back as Láeg and Cú Chulainn headed inside. “Hi,” he said.

Cormac looked him up and down. “So you’re the boy who has my baby cousin so enamoured,” he said, with a slight grin. “Hi. I’m Cormac.”

“Ferdia,” he replied, though it was clearly unnecessary. “You’re his older cousin?”

“One of them,” Láeg called from just inside the door; he hadn’t entirely abandoned Ferdia, though he’d taken himself out of view. “Cú has half a dozen of them.” 

“But I’m the only one currently on campus, which means I’m infinitely superior to the others,” said Cormac. To Ferdia, he added, “Naoise moved to the Hebrides and Conall’s out there visiting him right now. Which is to say, living in his house and aggravating him as much as physically possible.”

Ferdia’s eyes widened. “Naoise,” he repeated. “Why do I know that name?” 

“Have you been told about the Great Politics Department Schism of last year?” asked Láeg. It occurred him to that (a) Cú Chulainn had never told him what subject Ferdia was studying, and (b) Cú Chulainn himself was staying remarkably silent. In fact, when he looked around, his flatmate was nowhere to be seen – an impressive feat in a flat without walls. He must have gone to the bathroom, though whether he actually needed to pee or whether he was just hiding was unclear. 

“I heard a rumour,” admitted Ferdia.

“That’ll be why you’ve heard of Naoise, then,” said Cormac breezily. Láeg wasn’t fooled by his tone. Cormac had had a difficult time of it last year, torn between competing loyalties to his friends and to his dad, and it wasn’t like him to make light of what had happened. But maybe he didn’t feel able to talk about it in front of a near stranger… even one who was still somewhat damp and dishevelled from the rain. “Well, come in. I promised you a towel. No need for you to stand there in the hallway like a drowned rat.” 

Gratefully, Ferdia followed him inside, and Cormac tossed him a large blue bath towel that was lying on the sofa. 

“You’ll need a change of clothes,” said Láeg.

“I...” began Ferdia hesitantly. “I can just sit by the radiator until these dry off.” 

“Don’t be an idiot.” Cormac crossed the room to his drawers and pulled out a t-shirt and tracksuit bottoms. He held them up as though trying to gauge their size against Ferdia. “How tall are you?” 

“I don’t know, five eleven?”

Cormac claimed to be six foot on a good day, but Láeg was reasonably sure that wasn’t true – which meant the clothes would be fine. Cú Chulainn emerged from the bathroom just as Cormac pulled out an extremely orange pair of boxers and threw them at Ferdia, and he stopped dead at the sight of the pants flying across the room.

“Cormac, why are you throwing underwear at Ferdia?” he asked, his tone a little strangled. “I wasn’t gone _that_ long.” 

“Duh, because he’s soaked. Nobody wants to wear wet underwear. Isn’t that right, Ferdia?”

Ferdia flushed, his light hair even paler against the red of his cheeks. “I… sure. You didn’t have to, though.”

“Ah, but as I am frequently forced to admit to myself, I am an adult, and therefore in a position of some kind of responsibility towards freshers like yourself, so it would be remiss of me not to assist you in your state of crisis. Besides,” Cormac added, “I can’t let Láeg do all the mumfriending, or you’ll start liking him better than me.”

“I’ve only just met you,” said Ferdia, clutching the bundle of clothes and looking utterly bemused. “And Láeg, for that matter.” 

“Well, you know what they say about first impressions.” He gestured to the bathroom. “You probably want to go in there to change, unless you feel like giving everyone a show.” Ferdia blushed an even deeper shade of crimson. “Which would be highly inappropriate, on account of the fact that, as mentioned, I am an adult and you are a fresher.”

“Stop tormenting him, Cormac,” Láeg said, as the young man dashed for the bathroom. “The poor boy won’t know what’s hit him.”

“If he wants to date the puppy, he needs to know what he’s letting himself in for,” said Cormac, flopping down onto the sofa and tapping the space bar of his laptop to stop the music. “Isn’t that so, Cú?”

“I don’t even know if he _does_ want to date me!” said Cú Chulainn, sounding a little panicked. “We’ve been on _one date_ , and now he’s in your _flat_ and you’re – you’re _throwing underwear at him._ ”

“I have literally never worn that pair of pants.”

“That’s not the point! Anyone would think you’re _trying_ to embarrass me.” 

Cormac raised his eyebrow. “Well, obviously. I’m the closest thing you’ve got to an older brother, which makes it my responsibility to embarrass you at every given opportunity. Since getting out baby photos seems actively cruel, I’ll settle for the next best thing.”

“Which is to throw orange underwear at his boyfriend?” said Láeg, trying not to smile at the look of mingled outrage and relief on Cú Chulainn’s face as he heard Cormac’s promise not to show his pre-transition childhood pictures.

“I don’t know why everyone’s getting stuck on the underwear,” said Cormac, lying down and closing his eyes. “I’m just trying to do him a favour. I am a benevolent tormentor. You’re all in my house, for a start. What’s Ferdia’s story? His flatmates having a party too?”

“He said they were being annoying,” said Láeg, sitting down without waiting for Cormac to move his feet so that he was forced to move them rapidly out of the way or risk being sat on. “Didn’t specify the nature of said annoyance.”

“Actually,” said Cú Chulainn, “he said they were being dicks. Which means this probably isn’t an improvement.” This last point was aimed at Cormac, who smiled beatifically as though he’d been complimented, without opening his eyes.

Ferdia chose that moment to reappear, now wearing grey tracksuit bottoms and a t-shirt that read, IF VOTING CHANGED ANYTHING IT WOULD BE ILLEGAL. It fitted well enough; he was skinnier than Cormac, but more muscular, too, especially across the shoulders. He was rubbing his hair dry with the towel, and Láeg saw that it wasn’t as long as he’d initially thought – it probably came an inch or two below Ferdia’s chin. 

“Thanks for the clothes,” he said, hesitating in the doorway of the bathroom. “I’ll – I’ll wash them and get them back to you as soon as I can.”

“Sure, whenever,” said Cormac, looking over at him. “You can just leave them at Cú and Láeg’s. One of them will pass them on, or I’ll pick them up next time I’m over there stealing Láeg’s baked goods. Speaking of which...”

“Yeah, I brought cake.” Láeg pulled the tin out of the shopping bag at his feet and waved in vaguely in the air. 

“See, this is why you’re my friend,” said Cormac. “Also, like, the others abandoned us, so you’re all I’ve got left.”

“Wow, thanks.”

Ferdia pulled across one of the kitchen chairs and sat down, perched on the edge of the seat as though he wasn’t sure if he was really allowed to be sitting. His bare feet curled around the legs of the chair. “So, the great Politics Department Schism,” he began. “What actually _happened_ ?”

“You really want to know?” said Cormac, staring up at the ceiling.

Ferdia shrugged. “If you don’t mind. None of my friends know the full story.”

Cú Chulainn remained standing a moment longer, before he found a chair of his own. If the conversation was about his family drama, at least it wasn’t about him. Láeg could almost see the relief in his expression.

“Well, my dad’s head of the politics faculty, that’s the first thing you’ve got to know about this,” said Cormac. He didn’t attempt to sit up, though he did straighten his bent legs so that they were lying across Láeg’s lap. His socks were mismatched, and there was a hole in one of them. “He’s been head of department since before I joined the university, though I swear, I went through all the normal methods. It wasn’t nepotism. Also in the department: my friend Fergus. We both started our PhDs around the same time, but we’ve known each other way longer than that. He was Cú’s tutor, way back in the day. Family connection, you know.

“Anyway,” Cormac said with a sigh. “Me, Fergus, Dad. Then there’s Deirdre, doing international relations. Everyone calls her Dee. There’s Conall, who used to pop in to our grad seminars despite not technically being a student anymore. And there’s Naoise. He was a music student.” 

“You make it sound like he’s dead,” Ferdia observed. 

“Not dead,” said Láeg. “Just gone.” 

“And unlikely to come back.” Cormac opened one eye, looked at Láeg. “You feel like helping here?”

“I don’t know what there is to say,” said Láeg. “Cormac’s dad was Dee’s seminar leader, but there was… talk. Rumours that didn’t get dispelled, even when she started dating Naoise.”

“What kind of rumours?” asked Ferdia, all innocence, and then a moment later: “Oh. _Oh._ Were they… true?” 

“I don’t want to know,” said Cormac. “The one thing I haven’t asked Dad, to be honest. It’s not a conversation I want to have.”

“Things got… difficult.” An understatement. “Dee was considering transferring out of the department. Naoise was threatening to take legal action against Conchobar, or at least go to the press. He in turn threatened to fail Dee, so Naoise went to the student paper with that claim, at which point Conchobar pulled strings to try and get Naoise kicked out too. And he’s got friends in the music department, so it worked.”

“Wait, your dad got a student thrown out?” Ferdia said to Cormac when Láeg paused for breath. “Doesn’t that kind of suggest Naoise was onto something?”

“He claims that he was moving to have Naoise suspended for slander and a defamatory campaign against a senior member of staff.” Cormac sounded very tired. “Like I said, I don’t know. I don’t know what really happened between them. I just know that Naoise got put on probation, and had to go to a whole hearing where they decided whether or not to expel him, and he asked me and Fergus to go with him as character witnesses.”

“Even though it was your father who was trying to get him suspended?”

“Yep.”

“He shouldn’t have asked you to do that.”

“I could have said no.”

“But you didn’t.”

“No, I didn’t. It probably would have been better if I’d stayed out of it. I couldn’t help Naoise. I didn’t know whether the stories were true, and I couldn’t lie and say that I was sure of it. Dee swore blind they weren’t, but it got… messy. They were both temporarily suspended while the uni tried to figure out what to do about it and how to cover up the mess, but it was right before the summer, so the implication was that they’d come back for the new year.”

“And they didn’t,” said Láeg. “They left the country. Actually, we didn’t hear from them at all until a couple of weeks ago when Conall got their WiFi set up. As far as we knew they were dead in a ditch.”

“So that’s it?” said Ferdia. “It’s over?”

“If you can count it as ‘over’ when Fergus felt pressured into transferring to another university so as not to be in the same department as the man he testified against,” said Cú Chulainn, who had otherwise remained quiet during the conversation. “And when Cormac had to suspend his studies while he decides whether or not to do the same. And when no one in the family really knows what we’re meant to do about it, or whose side we should be on.” He glanced at his cousin: “I mean, theoretically I’m on yours, but I’m also still… here. And my dads want me to have dinner with Aunt Dechtire and your dad next weekend.” 

“Right.” Ferdia bit his lip. “And… your dad, Cormac? What happened to him?”

Cormac laughed hollowly. “Absolutely nothing, so far. Because he’s faculty and he’s been here a zillion years and who’s going to believe a couple of freshers over him? He’s untouchable.”

Once, late at night, Cormac had confessed to Láeg that he believed Dee and Naoise over his father.  _I should have done more to help them,_ he’d written, and this was back when neither of them had heard from the couple in weeks.  _And now I have to live with the knowledge that my father is capable of this, and that I’m a coward who can’t stand up to him._ But then he’d sworn him to secrecy, and it had never been clear after that whether he’d changed his mind, or whether he just felt there was no use making things worse now that it was too late to fix anything. 

An awkward silence fell. Ferdia fiddled with the hem of his borrowed t-shirt, and Cú Chulainn swung his legs,  letting his heels thump against the legs of his chair. Finally, Láeg said, “So anyway...”

“Cake,” said Cormac. “That was what we were talking about before. Who wants a piece?” He took the box from Láeg and went into the kitchen area in search of a knife to cut it with, before they’d even had a chance to answer.

“I’m sorry,” said Ferdia quietly. “I shouldn’t have asked.”

“I didn’t have to answer,” said Cormac, hearing him even over the clatter of cutlery. “Just like I didn’t have to lend you dry clothes. But I did. So that’s that. Cake?” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The song Cormac is listening to when they arrive is this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HqTxtMmNIjQ


	13. Chapter 13

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> More rain-related shenanigans that devolved into way more angst than I was expecting them to. Sorry.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> NB: I have never fixed a gutter in my life.

Láeg: _hey cormac is there anywhere in your flat that has walls_

Láeg: _like other than the bathroom_

In the kitchen area, Cormac’s phone buzzed. Láeg watched him take it out and read the two texts, then look at him quizzically across the room.

 _why_? he texted back between cutting slices of cake.

Láeg tilted his head at Cú Chulainn, sitting slouched in one of Cormac’s kitchen chairs, and Ferdia, perched shyly on the edge of his. He gave Cormac a meaningful look, then texted back, _want to pretend I need to talk to you so that they’ll stop behaving like they’ve never met before, but can’t do that if they can hear us._

“Who are you texting?” asked Cú Chulainn.

“Your dads,” Láeg replied shortly.

“Wait, what? How did you – you don’t have their numbers, do you?” He sounded genuinely panicked. “Oh fuck, they’re not texting you, are they? I’m sorry, I—”

“Hey,” said Láeg, “I’m kidding. Obviously I’m not texting your dads.”

“Why would you even joke about that?”

Cormac brought over the cake and a stack of plates. “Help yourselves,” he said. “Láeg, can I—”

There was a loud bang, a clatter, and the sound of gushing water. The gutter above one of Cormac’s windows had come loose from its fixings, unable to bear the weight of the heavy rain, and after swinging free for a moment, fell off the wall entirely, a sheet of water sluicing over the window. “We should… go fix that,” said Láeg, eyeing it and the ominous damp stains in the paintwork.

“Right,” said Cormac. “Because I totally know how to fix that.”

“It’s not that hard. You live in a basement, it’s barely eight feet up. Do you own a screwdriver? And possibly a step ladder?”

“I… am aware of what both of those things are.” Cormac crossed the room to a plastic crate in the corner and began rummaging through it. “I think I had a screwdriver somewhere…”

“I can help,” said Ferdia, while Cormac was occupied. He sounded a little bit too enthusiastic about the prospect.

“You’ve already got soaked once,” Láeg told him. “Cormac will run out of clothes to lend you. Stay here with Cú; we’ll deal with it.”

“Got one!” said Cormac triumphantly, holding aloft a tiny screwdriver.

“That looks like something you’d use to mend your glasses.” It definitely wasn’t big enough for gutter fixings. “You don’t have anything a little bigger?”

“What do you take me for?”

“A competent adult human who lives alone and is equipped to do basic DIY, at minimum.”

“You greatly overestimate me.”

Láeg probably should have seen this coming. He sighed, pulling on his coat. “We’ll get the toolkit from my car.”

“Of course your shitbox car has its own toolbox.”

He stopped and looked at Cormac. “Do you want me to help you fix your gutter or not? Because that kind of attitude is not the one that gets your gutter fixed.”

“Please, oh mighty Láeg, help me fix my gutter before my miserable basement floods for a third time.”

“Better.” Láeg glanced across at the other two. “This could take a while. You might want to put the TV on, or something.” He hoped it wouldn’t take a while, but if the two of them wanted to see the TV, they’d need to move to the sofa, and… well, Láeg wasn’t so proud as to consider himself above playing matchmaker. Not that they needed his help.

Cú Chulainn glanced once at Ferdia and then back at Láeg, panic visible in his expression. “Are you sure you don’t need any help?”

“Positive. Just don’t eat all the cake before we get back.” He put up his hood and ducked out into the rain, Cormac close behind him.

The toolbox in his car wasn’t a great one, but it could handle most things. Láeg had been stranded by the motorway one too many times before he learned how to fix the various things that went wrong most often – his car ran well right up until the moment it didn’t, and then it stopped in a dramatic fashion, sometimes with fire involved. Now he kept all the tools he might possibly need on hand at all times, along with a mini fire extinguisher. (Inevitably, the car had worked perfectly since the day he put the toolbox in the back, but that was life, wasn’t it?)

He grabbed the box, slammed the boot shut, and followed Cormac round the side of the house to the fallen gutter. It ran along the seam of the wall where his friend’s basement studio joined on to the maisonettes above; his little subterranean patio area was suffering its absence. On the plus side, it couldn’t have been far above street level, which meant it wasn’t too high. Still too high for Láeg to reach from the ground, though.

“You never answered on the stepladder question,” he said. He had to speak up to be heard over the sound of the rain pattering against his hood and the paving stones. It showed no signs of conveniently letting up so that they could finish the job without being half-drowned in the process.

“No stepladders,” said Cormac. “We balance precariously on flimsy plastic garden chairs like men.”

Láeg sighed. “Why are we even friends?”

“Because everyone in the sociology department has their head firmly stuck up their arse and you needed to talk to someone who did a real subject?” said Cormac. “I assume that’s how you ended up crashing politics dinners, anyway, but honestly, I never inquired too closely.”

Nor did anyone else. It was amazing how much you could get away with when everyone assumed you were there as somebody else’s guest. “Remind me to crash a different department next time.”

“Oh, you think you’ll find a D&D group in the Engineering department? Try again.”

“I might find someone who can mend their own gutter.” Láeg checked over the piece that had fallen. It didn’t look like it was broken – the fixing had just swung loose. It was a shitty plastic bracket, which was probably why it hadn’t been able to stand up to the downpour. “Man, you need better guttering,” he said.

“Nah, better gutters is how the assassins get in.” Cormac hefted the fallen piece and held it above his head, but he couldn’t quite reach to hold it in place. “If your gutter is too firmly attached they can climb it. Shitty gutters are a home defence system.”

“Shitty gutters are your landlord not caring enough about his tenants,” said Láeg. “Where are the garden chairs?”

Cormac lifted up the tarpaulin covering a sorry-looking table and four chairs. They looked exactly as flimsy as he’d indicated, but he dragged one over to the wall and placed it below the gutter anyway. Both he and Láeg regarded it for a moment.

“Right,” said Láeg eventually, when it became apparent that staring at an increasingly wet chair wasn’t actually going to make it any more solid or the gutter any less fallen. “How shall we do this?”

“You stand on the chair and fix the gutter. I hold the chair so it doesn’t fall over.”

“Sounds like I’m doing all the actual work.”

“You’re the competent human of the two of us.”

And wasn’t that a sorry state of affairs. Láeg steeled himself and climbed onto the chair, which wobbled alarmingly but then steadied beneath his feet. “Pass me the gutter,” he said, and Cormac did. “Now the screwdriver and that little plastic bag inside the toolbox.”

Holding the gutter with one hand, he clenched the bag between his teeth and used his other hand to retrieve the bolts. From there it was a simple matter to fix the bracket back onto the wall and hook the gutter into it, though he excavated a thick wodge of fallen leaves from the adjoining gutter in the process and tossed the soggy sludge down towards Cormac. “That’ll be why it fell,” he said. “The whole thing’s blocked. You should tell your landlord he needs to get someone in to clean it.”

“Can we go inside now?” said Cormac. “I’m pretty sure this coat isn’t waterproof. These shoes definitely aren’t.”

Láeg clambered back down off the chair. “What do you say?”

“Thank you for fixing my gutter, Láeg. You are truly a god among men. You wield your DIY skills like a thunderbolt from the heavens. You slay the  monsters of neglectful landlords and shoddy guttering with one thrust of your toolkit, and I am in awe of you because of it. Also, not to get side-tracked, but Cú Chulainn and Ferdia are curled up on the couch together and it’s intensely adorable.”

“Wait, what?” Láeg peered over Cormac’s shoulder to look through the small, grimy window. “They’re sitting on the couch. Sitting. Not curled up.”

“Sitting next to each other.”

“It’s a two person couch!” He punched Cormac’s shoulder. “You got me all excited for nothing. Also, I’m pretty sure your window frames are rotten.”

“Oh, yeah, for sure.”

“Cormac,” said Láeg seriously. “Have you ever actually … spoken to your landlord?”

“Look, rent around here is a nightmare and—”

He grabbed his friend’s arm to stop him from walking away. “Stop avoiding the question. This isn’t safe, Cormac. Your whole flat reeks of damp. You’ll get mould, and then you’ll get sick, and—”

“I didn’t think I was staying this long!” Cormac burst out. He pulled his arm free of Láeg’s grip and strode away.

Maybe there was more to this than Cormac’s lack of DIY skills and glib refusal to care. Láeg chased after him, aware that he looked faintly ridiculous, soaked through as he was, rain dripping from his eyebrows despite his hood being pulled as far forward as it would go. “Cormac…”

“It was meant to just be for the summer, okay? I didn’t realise my dad would—” He fumbled with his keys, trying to open the door. “I didn’t… fuck.”

Oh. This was... maybe worse than Láeg had realised. “Your dad?” he began, but this wasn’t a conversation they could have on the doorstep in the pouring rain. He took the keys from Cormac’s unsteady hands and opened the door, shepherding his friend inside. “We’ll come back to that. Where do you keep towels?"

“Chest at the end of the bed.”

“Go to the bathroom, get your wet clothes off. I’ll be with you in a moment.” Cormac obeyed, heading for the bathroom, and Láeg took a moment to drape his coat over the radiator and pull off his waterlogged shoes, relieved to have a minute to collect his scattered thoughts. Before he could walk over to the chest Cormac had indicated, Cú Chulainn jumped down from the sofa, crossed the room, flipped it open, and retrieved two towels, which he now held out to Láeg.

“You’re as soaked as he is,” he said. “Take these. I’ll find you both some clothes.”

Láeg opened his mouth to object, found nothing to argue about, and took the towels. “There’s a t-shirt and some pants in my rucksack,” he said. “I thought we might end up crashing overnight. But I’ll need some jeans.”

“I’ll handle it.” When he didn’t immediately move, his flatmate said, “Go! You’re dripping all over his floor.”

“Right. Yeah.” He followed Cormac into the bathroom, handing his friend one of the towels. Turning his back, he pulled off his jeans and t-shirt and wrapped himself in the towel. “You decent?” he asked.

“All the important bits are covered, if that’s what you mean,” said Cormac. “Not that it’s anything you haven’t seen before.”

“It doesn’t count when you’re drunk,” said Láeg, perching on the lid of the toilet. Cormac was towel-swaddled and curled up on the floor next to the bathtub, his wet hair plastered to his skull. “So,” he said. “Tell me. What happened with your dad? I thought things were getting better between you two.”

“I don’t want to talk about this.”

“You want to go sit with Cú Chulainn and Ferdia while clad only in a towel? No? Thought not. Then we’re having this conversation. What happened, Cormac? Why are you living in a damp basement with a neglectful landlord?”

Cormac sighed, leaning his head back against the bath, rivulets of water running from his hair down his bare shoulders. “I didn’t suspend my studies,” he said. “He – he sort of got me kicked out?”

“He _what_?!”

The words spilled out of Cormac then, falling over each other as though once he started, he couldn't stop. “He’s been holding it over my head that I won’t be reinstated unless I prove that Naoise and Dee were lying so – so I couldn’t just leave and go join Fergus because I knew he’d fuck that up for me somehow so I stayed in town but I can’t access my main bank account because he got hold of it, somehow, and I had to start a new current account but that means all my savings are out of my reach and all I’ve got is this shitty minimum wage job and this is the cheapest flat I could get on short notice and without references because it’s got mice and damp and the landlord’s sketchy as fuck but it’s okay if you never see him or at least you can pretend it is and I haven’t done a proper food shop in three weeks and—”

There was a knock on the door. “Leaving your clothes right outside,” called Cú Chulainn. “Uh. I’ll put the kettle on.” His footsteps retreated, but Cormac didn’t resume speaking. He just stared up at the ceiling, as though reading auguries in the damp patches in the plaster.

“Cormac,” said Láeg, helplessly, “why didn’t you _say_ anything?”

“What was I meant to say?” said Cormac. “‘Oh yeah so my dad sexually harassed an undergrad then convinced his postdocs to claim it was a secret but consensual relationship so as to discredit her when she came forward about it, before fucking up the lives of everybody who tried to hold him accountable for it, including mine, and now my entire academic career is in jeopardy and I’ve been trying to hide it with sarcasm?’ Way to be a bummer. I just. I didn’t want to admit it was actually happening. Mostly because that would mean believing it was actually happening.” He laughed. It sounded like a sob. “Anyway, I’m fucked. And broke. And will probably never get my PhD at this rate because the last two years of work have been kinda rendered null and void and the worst part is all I can think is that it must be worse for Dee because he drove her out of the fucking country so what right do I have to complain about it, really?”

“Fuck.” Láeg had no words, so he just repeated that one a few times, with increasing emphasis. “Just. Fucking _hell_. I… I kinda hate your dad.”

“Yeah, and you know what? It would be so much easier if _I_ did too,” said Cormac, and began to cry. 


	14. Chapter 14

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> exploring some of the fallout of the previous chapter, but ending on a more hopeful note :) (i'm sorry... this fic was meant to be fluff, the angst just crept in when i wasn't looking)

Láeg: _fergus did you know how bad it was_

Fergus: _what?_

Láeg: _did you know about cormac_

Fergus: _uhhhh  
_Fergus: _kind of_  
Fergus: _he didn’t tell me everything, but like, i’m not stupid, i joined the dots_

Láeg: _why didn’t either of you tell me?!_

Fergus: _has something happened?_

Láeg: _yeah cormac is crying on a bathroom floor wearing only a towel and I! don’t! know! what! to! do!  
_Láeg: _my instincts are leaning towards ‘go and murder his father’ but I’m not sure that would actually fix anything_

Fergus: _ah fuck  
_Fergus: _right_

Láeg: _…  
_Láeg: _fergus, you there?_

Fergus: _sorry i was just looking up how long it’ll take me to drive to you guys. conclusion: too long to be able to help in person right now. sorry._  
Fergus: _but  
_Fergus: _clothes seem like they’d be a good start?_

Láeg: _no shit_

Fergus: _if i knew the solution to getting kicked out because of conchobar’s fuckery don’t you think i’d have fixed my own life already?_

Láeg: _… you have a point_

Fergus: _it’s shit, láeg. the whole thing is really, really shit. idk what else you want me to say._

Láeg: _idk. I guess I just… wanted to know someone else out there knows what cormac’s going through_

Fergus: _we can skype naoise if that would help_

Láeg: _somehow I doubt it would_

Fergus: _yeah probably not_

Láeg: _...  
_Láeg: _…_  
Láeg: _fergus?_

Fergus: _still here_

Láeg: _I don’t think I’ve ever seen cormac cry before_

Fergus: _it’s fucking awful, isn’t it_

Láeg: _I don’t know what to do_

Fergus: _get him some clothes. make him a cup of tea. feed him some cake.  
_Fergus: _be his friend_

Fergus: …  
Fergus: …  
Fergus: _i’d do it myself if i wasn’t miles away_

Láeg: _he doesn’t blame you, you know_

Fergus: _that’s not the point_

* * *

Fergus, to Cormac: _i’m sorry i’m not there_

* * *

Fergus, to Cú Chulainn: _hey, puppy. not gonna get into details because i know your dads have attempted to keep you out of it as much as possible but your cousin’s going through a really shit time right now, so, uhh… i don’t know. i don’t know what you can do about it. there’s not much any of us can do about it really, but i figured you should know._

Cú Chulainn, to Fergus: _yeah, I’d sort of guessed by the fact he and Láeg disappeared into his bathroom forty minutes ago and haven’t come out yet. also I can hear everything they’re saying._

Fergus: _yikes, yeah, well i guess that would fill you in pretty quickly  
_Fergus: _you’re at his place rn?_

Cú Chulainn: _yep_

Fergus: _rip that must be awkward_

Cú Chulainn: _worse for Ferdia_

Fergus: _ferdia’s at his place too???  
_Fergus: _god. why the fuck am i miles away right now._

Cú Chulainn: _presumably for the same reasons that Cormac’s having a breakdown in his bathroom._

Fergus: _this is not the time for being a smartass_

Cú Chulainn: _I wasn’t.  
_Cú Chulainn: _his dad has a lot to answer for._

Fergus: _that much we agree on_

* * *

Family Conference

Cú Chulainn: _hey, I know you really wanted me to come to dinner with you next week, but I’m not sure I’m going to be able to make it_

Súaltaim: _why, do you have another date?_

Cú Chulainn: _no I just… I’m just not sure I want to go._

Lug: _ur cuz tld u nt 2 tlk 2 ur uncle?_

Cú Chulainn: _he didn’t tell me anything, I drew my own conclusions.  
_Cú Chulainn: _Aunt Dechtire said she was coming into town anyway, so maybe I can meet up with her, just us._

Súaltaim: _Cú… you need to be careful who you listen to. It’s been a difficult situation for your uncle, and there are a lot of people who have reasons to want to see him discredited._

Cú Chulainn: _don’t PATRONISE me, dad, I’m not a child  
_Cú Chulainn: _this isn’t about people wanting to see him ‘discredited’. this is Naoise leaving the country and Fergus moving two hundred miles away. this is his SON sobbing in the bathroom after weeks of lying to his friends and pretending he ‘suspended his studies’.  
_Cú Chulainn: _did you know? have you known this whole time?_

Lug: _dnt b hasty_

Cú Chulainn: _WHY WON’T YOU GIVE ME A STRAIGHT ANSWER?  
_Cú Chulainn: _oh wait I know  
_Cú Chulainn: _you did know, didn’t you, but you chose not to tell me_

Súaltaim: _I just think there’s a little more to it that you’re not taking into account._

Cú Chulainn: _well maybe if anyone would TELL me anything instead of acting like I’m too young to hear the truth, that wouldn’t be the case_

Súaltaim: _It wasn’t our business._

Cú Chulainn: _they’re FAMILY, of course it’s our business!_

Súaltaim: _I didn’t even know you were spending time with Cormac._

Cú Chulainn: _I can’t believe you two._

Lug: _we cn tlk abt it @ dinnr_

Cú Chulainn: _no.  
_Cú Chulainn: _I’m not coming._

Lug: _ur being absrd_

Cú Chulainn: _you can’t make me come._

Súaltaim: _Look, you’re clearly worked up. We’ll talk about this again tomorrow. Properly, not by text._

Cú Chulainn: _there’s nothing to talk about. you’re still defending him? after what he did?_

Súaltaim: _We’ll talk about this tomorrow._

Cú Chulainn: _I’d rather not._

* * *

Fergus, to Cormac: _you did the right thing, you know. even if it doesn’t feel like it_

* * *

Ferdia, to Emer: _how’s the party?_

Emer: _let’s just say I’m not drunk enough for this  
_Emer: _how’s your evening going?_

Ferdia: _I’m sitting in a stranger’s flat while said stranger has an emotional breakdown in the bathroom and his friend comforts him.  
_Ferdia: _the only person here that I know is Cú Chulainn and he’s kind of occupied  
_Ferdia: _like, there’s a full-on family schism happening here. or perhaps it already happened and this is just the fallout, idk, but I’m not thrilled about being caught up in it_  
Ferdia: _also I’m wearing somebody else’s clothes  
_Ferdia: _specifically the guy who is having the breakdown. I’m wearing his clothes. I. I don’t know what to do about this._

Emer: _yikes_

Ferdia: _the worst part is, they gave me a lift here, so it’s not even like I can sneak out while they’re all busy. idek where we are tbh._

Emer: _double yikes_

Ferdia: _what do I dooooooooooo_

Emer: _you might have to call an uber  
_Emer: _unless there’s someone else you know who can drive?_

Ferdia: _not really_

Emer: _call a taxi and come join us  
_Emer: _half the ballet soc is here…_

Ferdia: _let me guess they’re all lightweights and you’re bored_

Emer: _god. YES. see this is why I need you to be here. you understand me, ferdia_

Ferdia: _well, maybe… I feel bad about just, like, leaving_

Emer: _why are you even there anyway_

Ferdia: _asking myself the same question  
_Ferdia: _I got caught in the rain, Cú Chulainn offered me a lift, his flatmate invited me to hang out with them… *shrug* it’s possible I’m just an idiot_

Emer: _this sounds like the world’s worst second date_

Ferdia: _you can say THAT again_

Emer: _you know what you gotta do about that?_

Ferdia: _what?_

Emer: _invite him on a third date before it all goes tits-up._

Ferdia: …  
Ferdia: _that’s kind of the least of my concerns right now_

Emer: _no, it isn’t, and when you’re wearing your own clothes again you’ll realise that  
_Emer: _call a taxi, then two minutes before it arrives, ask him out. if he says no you can make a quick getaway before things get awkward. sorted._

Ferdia: _that’s … actually not a terrible plan_

Emer: _no plan I’ve made has ever been a terrible one._

Ferdia: _well that’s a lie_

* * *

Fergus, to Cormac: _none of it was for nothing, cormac_

* * *

Láeg, to Fergus: _well, he’s dressed, so that’s progress  
_Láeg: _and so am I. sort of neglected to mention that I was naked this whole time too but hey, now you know_

Fergus: _gross  
_Fergus: _nobody needs that mental image, láeg_

Láeg: _I just wish I could fix this._

Fergus: _out of interest… have you checked dee’s instagram today?_

Láeg: _she has instagram?_

Fergus: _i’ll take that as a no. go look. it might help._

* * *

_Dee (@sorrowscream) – 5:49pm_

Sometimes I wish I could turn back the clock on this whole year. Just start all over again. It’s certainly had its dark moments, and there are a lot of things I wish had never happened. If you’d asked me this time last year where I thought I’d be today, I wouldn’t say, “Sitting in the kitchen of the little farmhouse I rent with my boyfriend in the Hebrides while he sprays his cousin with a hose.” It probably wouldn’t have involved abandoning my degree to leave the country and all my family behind, with no clear indication of when I’ll be coming back.

But then sometimes I watch Naoise chasing Conall with the power hose or I see the sun setting over the loch or I spend the day out in the garden forgetting that the world exists, and the bleakness sort of fades away. It’s not gone. It’ll never be gone. But it was almost worth it, because without that, I wouldn’t have… this. And I’m happy.

It took a long time to say that, because I wasn’t sure if it was true, and then I wasn’t sure if I was *allowed* to be happy when so many people have suffered because of this. But I am. I’m happy because I have a life and a man that I love more than anything and a future that *isn’t* full of essay deadlines and dissertation meetings, because it turns out that’s never what I wanted in the first place. And I’m also happy because I have friends who stood by me when the whole world wanted to believe I was lying, even when it hurt them.

I took this photo this morning, just as the sun was rising. I like the way it seems to melt across the landscape, like liquid light. This isn’t the landscape I thought I’d be looking at, but it’s one that looks a lot like hope.

_[@nishmacish and 43 others liked this]_

* * *

“It’ll be okay, Cormac.”

Cormac raised his head, eyes red and expression dismal. “I’ve yet to see any evidence that anything is ever okay.”

Láeg handed him the phone. He took it reluctantly, but the bewildered crease between his eyebrows faded as he read Dee’s caption.

“You did the right thing,” said Láeg. “It might not seem like it now, but you did. And in the end, it’ll be worth it.”

Cormac passed the phone back. “You don’t know that.”

“I know you’re a good enough friend to stand up to your father. That means something.”

Cú Chulainn pushed the bathroom door open. Láeg felt too wrung-out to tell him to leave, especially when he saw that his flatmate was holding two steaming mugs of tea. “I brought you these,” he said, putting them down in front of them. “And there’s still cake, if you want it.”

“Is Ferdia still here?” asked Cormac, taking the mug and wrapping his long fingers around it as though it were the only spark of warmth in a bitter wind.

“He left about ten minutes ago. Took a taxi home, said he didn’t want to intrude.”

“Shit, sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry.” Cú Chulainn gave him a small smile. “Before he left, he asked me to meet him for lunch on Monday.”

Cormac managed to look slightly more cheerful at that. “Nice one, puppy.”

“I think we need cake,” said Láeg, levering himself off the bathroom floor and holding out his hand to Cormac. “Come on. You planned your afternoon around cake, and it’s important to keep to those kinds of schedules.”

“I forgot to timetable in the emotional breakdown,” said Cormac. “It’s thrown the whole thing out of whack.”

“You’ll have to eat twice the cake to make up for it, then.”

For a moment, it looked like Cormac wasn’t going to get up. Then, finally, he transferred his mug of tea to his right hand and reached up with his left to take Láeg’s. “Twice?” he repeated. “No, we’ll need three times the cake at minimum. I think you’re underestimating the severity of this scheduling error.”

“Well, in that case,” said Láeg, “no time to waste.”


	15. Chapter 15

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> CONSIDERABLY less angsty than the last couple of chapters (i apologise again for those). in this one, cormac and cú chulainn explain some of the convolutions of their family tree to láeg, who is less than thrilled by the experience.

They ended up staying the night.

Láeg didn’t want to leave Cormac on his own – not because he thought his friend would do anything stupid, but because he was still kicking himself for not realising how bad things had got, and for believing Cormac when he’d made light of the situation. He should’ve been there. Maybe if he’d known, he would have been able to help, instead of making Cormac feel worse by trying to get him to move in with them. Now that he _did_ know, he had months to make up for.

He offered to drop Cú Chulainn back at their flat, but the boy shook his head. “Cormac’s family,” he said. “I’m staying.”

It wound up that Cú Chulainn took the sofa – he was the only one small enough to curl up on it in a way that was even vaguely comfortable, since Láeg was about a foot too long – and Láeg resigned himself to a night on the floor.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” said Cormac. “The flat has mice, remember? And damp? You sleep on that floor, you’ll get nibbled. And mouldy.”

“I doubt I’d grow mould in the course of one night,” said Láeg, though the idea of having mice crawling across his face while he slept wasn’t an appealing one. “It’s fine, I’ll manage.”

“I have a double bed, and you’re, like, six inches wide. We can share.”

“No, it’s fine, I’ll—”

Cormac was already hunting around for a fresh pillowcase and shoving one of his numerous cushions into it. “Don’t argue with me,” he said, interrupting Láeg before he’d thought of a decent excuse. “I’m not letting you sleep on my health-hazard floor when you brought me cake and then let me cry on you for like an hour. My life may be a complete fucking disaster, but I’m not that shitty a friend.”

Láeg abandoned his excuses. “Well, if you’re sure…” he began, after a moment.

Cormac tossed the pillow onto the bed. “I’m sure. Just don’t steal the covers.”

“Do I get a pillow?” asked Cú Chulainn, and in response, Cormac threw one directly at his head. He caught it. “Thanks. Love you too.”

“You don’t have to stay,” said Cormac. He’d said this about four times since they informed him they weren’t leaving, a kind of earnest hope in his voice that suggested he’d feel guilty if they did, but also desperately didn’t want them to leave. “I’m fine. I’ve been managing fine for the past three months.”

“We’re staying,” said Láeg, “because I don’t know what state our building will be in when we get back, and then tomorrow we are going home and you’re going to stay with us until we figure out a way to fix this.”

“No,” said Cormac. “This isn’t your problem. And this flat isn’t that bad.”

“There’s black mould on your kitchen counters,” said Cú Chulainn. “And your toilet cistern’s cracked.”

“I’ve seen worse.” He appealed to Láeg. “Remember that flat Fergus lived in when you were a fresher? That place was _infested_ with cockroaches.”

“Just because it could be more of a health hazard doesn’t mean it isn’t currently a health hazard,” Láeg pointed out. “We don’t have keys for the other two rooms but we can get an airbed and you can sleep on my floor, or there’s the couch in the living room, though I doubt it’s any comfier. At least it would be _clean_.”

“I can’t,” said Cormac. “If my dad finds out I’m staying in university accommodation—”

“He can’t stop you crashing on your friend’s floor!”

“You don’t know what he can or can’t do! I didn’t think he could get us kicked out, either, but I guess I was wrong about that, wasn’t I?” Cormac stormed over to his chest of drawers, yanking one of them open. It stuck partway, and he had to wrench it, pulling it free with the squeak of damp-swollen wood too tight for its fittings. He pulled out a couple of t-shirts without looking at them, throwing one at Cú Chulainn and one at Láeg. “You can wear those to sleep, if you want. But I can’t come and stay with you. I don’t want to give him an excuse to fuck your lives up too.”

“I’m not in his department,” said Láeg, “and Cú’s his nephew.”

“I’m his _son_ , and Naoise was a music student,” said Cormac.

“A valid point,” said Cú Chulainn. “But I’m pretty sure my dads would have something to say about it if he messed with me, and I’m not sure Aunt Dechtire would be thrilled, either.”

Cormac smiled faintly. “Okay, Aunt Dechtire yelling at my dad _would_ be pretty entertaining to watch. I’m fairly sure he’s scared of her.”

“I can’t blame him,” said Cú Chulainn.

“I’m confused,” admitted Láeg. “If Dechtire is both of your aunts…”

“Technically, she’s my mum. I just call her my aunt, because, well, it’s less confusing.”

“Wait, _what_?”

“I have two dads, Láeg, I had to come from somewhere.”

“I’m not actually related to either Súaltaim or Lug,” said Cormac helpfully. “It’s Dechtire we’re related through. She’s my dad’s sister.”

“Wait, so all your cousins…” Láeg looked at Cú Chulainn. “They’re all via your _mum_? Or … egg donor or whatever you want to call her?”

“Wait until you hear about my father’s side.”

Cormac groaned. “Don’t start on that whole mess. I don’t even try and keep it straight anymore. I asked Lug to draw me a family tree once and he just _looked_ at me like I was a complete imbecile, so I never asked again. I’ve literally never felt stupider in my life, and I once sat through an entire German lecture because I didn’t realise I was in the wrong room, despite the fact that _I don’t speak German._ Your father’s death-glare is _terrifying_.”

“Oh, no, it’s not that he thinks you’re stupid,” said Cú Chulainn. “It’s that he doesn’t know either, but he’ll never admit it.”

Cormac stared at him for a minute, and then a look of glee dawned across his face. “You’re kidding me,” he said. “Oh my _god_.”

“I swear I’m not.”

“That’s hilarious.” Cormac began to laugh. “I should’ve realised that earlier, that’s so _obviously_ what happened. For eight years I’ve been thinking he thinks I’m a moron and this whole time it’s just been that he’s too ashamed to admit he doesn’t know who’s his aunt and who’s his second cousin. _Classic._ ”

“Your father doesn’t know his own family tree?” asked Láeg, curious, although he supposed if every branch of the family had as many schisms and shenanigans as Cormac’s, it wouldn’t be hard to lose track.

“Trust me, if you’d met any of them, you’d understand.” Cú Chulainn shrugged. “I just kind of assume I’m related to everyone at this point, and don’t concern myself with the finer details. It makes life a lot easier.”

“And Súaltaim?” He was almost afraid to ask.

“Virtually no relatives, as far as I’m aware. But that’s okay. There are enough to go around as it is.”

“Huh.” Láeg had a couple of brothers and a handful of cousins, but his wasn’t what you would call a _large_ family, and it didn’t have anything like the dynastic drama of his friends’. He wondered which was more typical: the feuds and tangles of Cormac’s extended family tree, or the quiet mediocrity of most of his relatives.

The topic of families seemed like a dangerous one, though, so Láeg decided to move on. He picked up the t-shirt Cormac had thrown at him and unfolded it, reading the slogan across the front: NO FRACKING WAY. It was an intense shade of orange. “Did you buy this one for that protest you drove out to?” he asked, holding it up.

“What?” Cormac looked up, squinted at the shirt for a minute, and then shrugged. “Don’t remember. I’ve got a couple like that.”

Cú Chulainn examined the green t-shirt he’d been given. In large letters it read: ASK ME ABOUT THE SINGLE MARKET. In smaller letters, below, it read: _it’s me. i’m single._ He raised his eyebrow at his cousin.

Cormac didn’t seem in the least bit ashamed. “Fergus bought me that after I gave him one that said BIG DUMBASS ENERGY.”

“Do you own a single plain t-shirt?” Láeg asked, genuinely curious. Most of his own wardrobe consisted of inoffensive buttoned shirts, the majority of them in some variety of plaid. He also had a fairly complete colour spectrum of plain t-shirts, but virtually none with slogans on them. Cú Chulainn, on the other hand, seemed almost exclusively to wear souvenir t-shirts from various performances he’d done or attended.

“A couple,” said Cormac. “Also this one.” He pulled one out of the drawer and held it up. At first inspection it looked plain, until you peered more closely and saw that in the bottom corner there was a print of a small hedgehog wearing a helmet and wielding an axe. “I have no idea where this one came from. I feel like it’s just a t-shirt that… _happened_ to me.”

Cú Chulainn disappeared into the bathroom and came out wearing the _single market_ t-shirt. It came almost to his knees. Láeg would have hazarded that it was oversized even on Cormac, but it made his flatmate look about eleven years old.

“It’s not true, of course,” said Cú Chulainn. “Given that I am currently the least single I’ve ever been.” He had a tiny smile on his face as he spoke.

“I feel,” said Cormac ponderously, “like my emotional breakdown may have robbed me of the opportunity to properly appreciate the fact that Ferdia was in my flat. So much mockery, and I missed the chance to do any of it.”

“You threw underwear at him,” Láeg reminded him.

“I was being _helpful._ ” He pulled his own t-shirt over his head and swapped it for a royal blue pyjama top. “Anyway, I feel deprived. Such a squandered opportunity. I don’t suppose you can manufacture a repeat of the occasion? By which I mean Ferdia being in my flat, not me having a mental breakdown.”

“Ferdia is never coming back to this flat,” said Cú Chulainn. “Mostly because I don’t want to poison him. And you probably shouldn’t come back here, either.”

“I have a six month lease.”

“I don’t care,” said Láeg. “We’re getting you out of here. If you won’t come and stay with us, then we’ll find you somewhere else, somewhere that’s less of a death trap.”

“I don’t even know if I’m staying, Láeg,” said Cormac quietly. “Fergus thinks I should join him. I haven’t ruled it out. There’s no point trying to find somewhere to live here if I’m not sticking around.”

Láeg swallowed. Moving across the country to join Fergus would make sense. It would give Cormac a chance to return to his studies, somewhere that his father couldn’t interfere. Fergus would have found somewhere where the department wasn’t full of Conchobar’s cronies. And if Cormac decided that that was what he wanted, then he would support that, and do everything he could to make the move easier.

He just… didn’t think it _was_ what his friend wanted. Was that his own selfishness talking? He didn’t want Cormac to leave, it was true; it was bad enough that Fergus and Naoise were gone, and that Conall didn’t visit so much these days because he was always travelling. Without Cormac, his entire friendship group would be gone, and he’d be forced to start again. But there was more to it than that. He didn’t want Cormac to leave if he was only doing it because he felt driven away, if he felt that he _couldn’t_ stay for fear of his father.

Conchobar had driven enough people away already.

He took a deep breath. “If you leave,” he said steadily, “I will help you move. I will drive you as far as you want to go and I will do it with a sofa strapped to the roof of my car if that’s what you need. But if you stay, it will not be in this flat. And from now on, when shit gets real, you _tell_ us, okay? You’re my friend, Cormac – fuck knows why, but you are, and you’re stuck with me.”

Cormac’s expression was fragile. “Thanks, Láeg,” he said hoarsely. “I… I appreciate that.”

“I mean it. You talk to me in future, okay? Don’t just pretend everything’s okay right up until the moment you can’t lie anymore.”

His friend nodded, and opened his mouth to speak, but he was interrupted by both of their phones chiming simultaneously.

Cells & Serpents 

Conall: _naoise sprayed me with a power hose and now I have at least two fewer layers of skin than I did this morning :( how’s it going for the rest of you?_

Láeg read the message and looked across at Cormac, unsure how to answer. Cormac saved him the effort by doing it himself.

Cormac: _oh no biggie just had a huge emotional breakdown lmao. but now láeg is feeding me cake and wearing my clothes and we’re all good._

Conall: _don’t really know why wearing your clothes is a part of that equation but okay_

Cormac: _cú and ferdia are also wearing my clothes today. it’s that kind of a day._

Conall: _you know what, I regret even asking_

Naoise: _Your skin is fine, Conall, stop being a baby.  
_Naoise: _Glad you’re doing better, Cormac. What kind of cake?_

Láeg: _it’s a kind of… chocolate fudge layer cake thing?_

Fergus: _and yet again I regret being two hundred miles away_

“What’s happening?” asked Cú Chulainn.

Cormac mustered a smile. “Oh, the usual. I’m rapidly remembering why the universe decided to separate our friendship group.”

“You think there was a reason?” asked Láeg.

“Oh, yeah, for sure,” he said. “That amount of chaos in one place? Nothing would have survived the impact. We had to be dispersed for the greater good.” He looked wistfully at the remaining cake, now safely back in its box and waiting in the kitchen. “Plus there would never have been enough cake for all six of us.”

“Six?” There had only ever been five stars in this particular constellation.

“Sure,” said Cormac, looking over at his cousin. “We’ve got the puppy now, haven’t we?”


	16. Chapter 16

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A fair amount of silliness in this chapter, really. I think we needed it, after all the Drama(TM).

It was not the best night’s sleep Láeg had ever had. It probably wasn’t the worst, either, but it was somewhere on the shortlist. Cormac’s bed, it turned out, was only comfortable if you slept directly in the middle of it, and so he found himself with a spring embedded directly into his spine, no matter how much he tossed and turned. When he rolled over for the fourth time, he found Cormac looking back at him, eyes open and glittering in the bluish light cast by his alarm clock.

“Fucking uncomfortable, isn’t it?” said his friend in a low voice. “Maybe I should’ve let you take your risks with the floor.”

“I meant it about the airbed,” Láeg whispered back. “It can’t be worse than this. You can sleep on our floor until we find someone who needs a flatmate and has a room that’s not actively trying to kill you.”

“And I meant it when I said I couldn’t,” said Cormac. “I appreciate the offer, I really do, but… I can’t.”

It was the answer he’d been expecting, but Láeg was disappointed anyway. “Will you come with us tomorrow nonetheless? We could use the backup when we head home. We don’t know what the damage from the party will be, and we might need someone to go shout at the neighbours who won’t have to live with them for the next year.”

Cormac’s smile was barely visible, just the faintest glimpse of white teeth in the murky half-light. “All right. I’ll come back with you tomorrow. But only to act as your bodyguard, and only if you pay me in food. I’ve got none in the house.”

“That, I can do,” said Láeg. “I’ll drop you home after dinner.”

“You don’t have to drop me off. I can get the bus.”

“You _can_ ,” agreed Láeg. “But you don’t have to.” He shifted, trying to avoid the spring currently making its best attempt at prising apart his vertebrae, but only succeeded in locating another one somewhere in the region of his shoulder blade. “You know, I think your mattress is faulty.”

“Yeah?”

“It appears to be made entirely of springs.”

Cormac laughed softly. “Yeah, I know. I’ve got a theory it’s not quite as terrible if you lie horizontally across it, but I’m too long for that.”

“As am I,” said Láeg. “Cú Chulainn would probably fit.”

“He would. But he’s sorted.” Cú Chulainn was fast asleep on the sofa, and had been for the past two hours. Láeg envied him so profoundly it was carving a chasm of jealousy through his heart. “He can complain all he likes about being small, but it’s got some perks.”

“Now which side of the family does he get that from?”

“Oh, from Aunt Dechtire for sure,” said Cormac, without even having to consider the question. “She’s the sort of woman who is small and angry and absolutely ready to end you if you cross her. He takes after her a lot.”

“Is your father really scared of her?”

He was silent for a long moment, and Láeg regretted asking the question, regretted ever mentioning Conchobar just at a moment when Cormac seemed to have relaxed and let his guard down. Finally, his friend said, “I don’t know. We joke that he is, but I think that’s because the only way any of us can imagine living with him is by holding your own and giving as good as you get. They don’t spend a lot of time in each other’s company these days. But there was one year when we had a big gathering and – oh, I can’t even remember what it was about, but she was furious about _something_ , and she tore him a new one in front of literally everyone in the family.”

“Which is a lot of people,” Láeg interjected.

“That it is. I’ve never seen him so humiliated.” He smiled. “I used to think I should feel bad for having enjoyed that as much as I did, but now I think I didn’t enjoy it enough. My father being yelled at by small angry women, and actually listening? It should happen more. Maybe it would have helped, if enough women had yelled at him enough times.”

Láeg lay silently for a moment, feeling inadequate. Finally, he said, “We’ll fix this. I don’t know how, but we will.”

“It’s okay,” said Cormac. “You don’t have to fix it. It’s enough that I’m not alone amidst all the awful fuckery of it.” He reached out and clasped Láeg’s hand. “And you’re a brave, brave man for enduring these bedsprings. I’m proud to call you my friend.”

“And you’re a dick,” said Láeg, laughing as quietly as he could so as not to wake Cú Chulainn.

“Yep,” said Cormac. “But I’m _your_ dick.” He scooted around on the bed, pushing Láeg with him. “Come on. Let’s horizontallify this.”

“That’s not a word.”

“Let’s do it anyway. Can’t be worse than the springs. Our feet will hang down and get eaten by mice but at least we’ll still have spines by the morning.”

Láeg grabbed his corner of the duvet and dragged it round with him. Cormac was right; it _was_ marginally more comfortable this way around, even if, as predicted, his legs were hanging off the side. He curled up and tucked them underneath the duvet cover, and felt the mattress shift as Cormac did the same.

“There,” said his friend. “It’s almost like a functional bed now.”

“You have such a low bar for what you expect from your furniture,” said Láeg, “and yet somehow, it’s _still_ failing to pass.”

* * *

Despite his promises that he’d come home with them, Cormac had changed his tune by morning. “I’ll just get in your way,” he said. “You must have work to do.”

“We’ll find something useful you can do,” Láeg told him. It was nearing noon, and they hadn’t set off for their own flat yet, so he’d reached the point where his only priority was a shower and a square meal. “Like… scrubbing the bathroom, or something.”

“I know something you could help with,” said Cú Chulainn. “You can help me decide what subject to switch to.”

“You’re switching?” said Cormac. “For real?”

“Yep. And you seem to know practically everyone, so you can tell me the gossip about various departments and help me decide which one sounds the least likely to result in majorly disruptive drama. Deal?”

“I don’t know _everyone,_ ” said Cormac, but he gave in, and now at last here they were – the two cousins sitting on the sofa with Cú Chulainn’s laptop and a prospectus, going through the module lists and trying to figure out which ones he’d hate the least, and Láeg in the kitchen, baking, because what else was he supposed to do? His actual work? As if.

He’d decided to make hot cross buns. It was a stupid thing to make in October, really, but he’d never made them before, so they might actually require enough of his attention to function as an effective distraction from everything that was going on inside his head, and he’d eaten too many cakes recently. Plus, he’d promised to bring something to a departmental gathering later in the week, and someone had put down on the form that they were coeliac. He’d had the gluten-free flour lingering in the back of his cupboard for a while now – he’d bought it for a particular recipe, and never used the rest. Might as well see if he could wrangle some coeliac-safe hot cross buns.

It was all going frustratingly smoothly until he got halfway down the recipe and realised that the dough would need to rise before he could bake it, which meant at least an hour sitting around with nothing to take his mind off the fact that one of his closest friends had been struggling – for _months_ – and he hadn’t realised, too caught up in his own petty dramas.

Well, shit.

Láeg covered the bowl and left it in the warmest corner of the kitchen, then scrubbed his hands, trying to remove all sticky traces of the dough from his skin. It resisted his efforts, apparently having fused indelibly to his knuckles and under his nails.

As he turned the tap off, his friends’ voices became audible again. “I don’t know,” Cú Chulainn was saying, “I’m just not sure I’m particularly interested in the Cold War. Is it seriously a compulsory module?”

“Looks like it.” Cormac dropped the prospectus on the floor. “Okay, I know a lot about what you’re _not_ interested in. Did _anything_ there sound like a plausible option?”

Cú Chulainn shrugged. “Plausible, yes. Appealing, less so.”

“You used to be great at maths. Why are you only looking at arts subjects?”

“Because (a) I think I’d have a harder time convincing them to let me switch to something STEM-related and (b) maths seems way too much like something my dad would think is useful.”

“Not if you only did the complicated theoretical stuff.” But Cormac conceded the point and turned his attention back to the laptop. “Okay. Let’s start again. Anthropology?”

“I don’t care enough about people for anthropology.”

That made Cormac laugh. “Criminology?”

“Ditto, and also, sounds too potentially useful.”

“Drama?”

Cú Chulainn paused. “Are you just going alphabetically through the website now?”

“Yes, obviously. So?”

“Got enough drama queens in the family.”

“That you do. Okay, knocking that off the list. English? It seemed like you didn’t hate all the modules for that. They’ve got some interesting comparative stuff going on with various language classes…”

“Hmm. It’s a possibility, I guess.” Cú Chulainn glanced over at Láeg. “Given up on the baking?”

“Waiting for the dough to rise,” said Láeg. Cormac had got thinner. It was obvious, watching him now, the way he and his cousin were sprawled across the sofa together. They were both all angles and elbows, though their build wasn’t at all alike; both had cheekbones that looked like they’d cut you. And Cormac hadn’t always looked like that.

He knew it wasn’t productive to hate himself for not noticing that his friend was struggling – that self-loathing wouldn’t change anything about the past, and all he could do was support Cormac now that he _did_ know what was going on. But. _But_ knowing that feelings weren’t productive had never stopped Láeg from having them, so he was simultaneously feeling it and also angry at himself for feeling it, so wrapped up in that spiral of self-hatred that he almost missed Cormac’s question.

“What are you making?”

He pulled his attention back to the present. “Hot cross buns,” he said.

His friend looked at him as though he were the one they should be worrying about. “You know it’s October, don’t you?”

“Ah, well, kill Jesus early and you get it over with, don’t you,” said Láeg absently, hardly thinking about the words until they’d already left his mouth, at which point he realised that they sounded substantially weirder than they had in his head. Cormac stared at him for a moment, and then spluttered with surprised laughter. He tried to contain it, but took one look at Láeg’s deadpan expression and cracked up all over again.

Calmly, as though oblivious to his cousin’s hysterics, Cú Chulainn said, “Ah now, wait until after Christmas at least, surely. You can’t kill him when he’s not been born yet.”

“Cú,” Láeg began, in a very serious tone, “are you suggesting we should crucify a _baby_?”

“He’ll only be three months if you wait until Easter, that’s hardly better,” his flatmate argued.

“Oh my god,” began Cormac, between gasps of helpless laughter. “You.. are … a _theology_ … student.”

“Now you see why I’m changing subject,” said Cú Chulainn simply, and at that, Láeg’s poker face failed him and his laughter erupted in an undignified snort. His amusement set Cormac off again, to the point where there were tears physically streaming from his eyes – which seemed excessive to Láeg, really. It _hadn’t_ been that funny… although given that he couldn’t stop himself from cracking up, either, maybe it had.

Cú Chulainn alone seemed unaffected by it all, but the corner of his mouth was twitching in a way that suggested he was more amused than he was letting on.

“Drama,” said Láeg firmly, once he’d got himself under control. “No question about it. You should do drama, if you can keep a straight face like that.”

“Excuse you,” said his flatmate. “I have never done anything straight in my life.”

Cormac made a strangled noise, like a small animal being squeezed too tightly. “Stop,” he gasped, fighting for breath. “Please just. stop talking. You’re killing me. I – I can’t.”

They duly shut up, the silence punctuated by Cormac’s hysterical splutters as he desperately attempted to stop laughing. When he’d finally begun to regain some of his composure – almost two full minutes later – Láeg said, “You know, it really wasn’t that funny.”

“It was the _way_ you said it,” said Cormac. “Like – like you didn’t even need to think about it.”

“Well, it’s common sense. Get the murder done in October and then you’re not waiting around until March to be doing it.”

“That’s not how Easter works!”

“Oh, I’m sorry, who in this room is a theology student? Not you.”

“Not you, either,” Cormac retorted. “And the puppy doesn’t count, since he’s switching. If he can ever make up his mind about what to switch to.” This was directed at his cousin, who just smiled beatifically and picked up the prospectus from the floor.

“I’m going to rip the pages out of this,” he said, “throw them into the air, and whichever one I catch first will be the subject I take.”

“That is the worst fucking idea I’ve ever heard,” Láeg told him flatly. “Do you want us to just choose for you? Because I am about three seconds from calling your tutor on your behalf and telling them you wanna switch to…” He glanced over at the laptop screen. “Astrophysics.”

“I am _not_ switching to astrophysics.”

“Then pick something already. Via a _sensible_ means of decision-making,” he added. “Alternatively, I could call your dads.”

“Do not,” said Cú Chulainn dangerously. “Don’t even think about it.”

Láeg waggled his phone at his flatmate. “You’ve got one hour while I take a nap. When I wake up I want you to have narrowed it down.”

“And you say you’re not the mumfriend,” said Cormac.

Láeg was halfway to the door by that point, which was the main reason he didn’t throw something at his friend. He turned back and said, “If either of you touches my bun dough, you will lose a finger.”

“We’re not gonna touch your buns,” said Cormac.

“Well, sounds like I arrived at just the right moment,” said a third voice, as familiar as it was unexpected. “Whose buns are we touching?”

They all turned to face the new arrival, who nudged the front door shut with his elbow and dumped a heavy rucksack on the floor of the corridor as though unconcerned by the three sets of eyes now fixed on his every movement.

Láeg was the first to recover the power of speech. “Fergus,” he said, “how the _fuck_ did you get into my flat?”


	17. Chapter 17

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which I attempt to deal with our unexpected new arrival, since as I may have mentioned, I did not plot this fic at all and had no idea he was going to turn up

Láeg did not get his nap.

Without answering his question, Fergus unlaced his boots and left them near the front door, padding down the corridor as though he knew the flat like the back of his hand, despite the fact that he’d never been there before. He wandered unconcernedly into the living room, where the three of them stared at him, and sat down on the sofa next to Cú Chulainn.

“So,” he said, reaching for the laptop. “What are you up to? Hmm. Astrophysics. Not really your style, I’d have thought.”

“Hello to you too,” said Cú Chulainn, pulling the laptop out of his reach and closing the tab. “And that would be because I’m not switching to astrophysics. Fergus, why are you here? _How_ are you here?”

“Seconded,” said Láeg. “I repeat my question: how the fuck did you get in?” There was no way Fergus had a key to their flat. He’d been living halfway across the country since before Láeg moved in, let alone Cú Chulainn. “I mean, it’s not that I’m not glad to see you, but—”

Fergus put his arm around Cormac and squeezed. “I’m here because I thought this bastard could use the moral support, and as for how I got in… well, to cut a long and boring story short, uni security is shite and they were way too happy to let me charm a set of keys out of their receptionist. Like, that should not be allowed. I could be sketchy as hell, for all they know. I could have been breaking and entering.”

“Technically, you were,” said Láeg.

“Technically, I didn’t break anything,” said Fergus, “which means I was just entering. And yet they gave me the keys.”

“Yeah, they should _not_ have done that,” said Láeg. It was probably that the security staff had seen Fergus with him enough times over the last few years to assume there was a legitimate reason why Fergus would be asking for a key, but given that he wasn’t even a member of the university anymore, they should definitely not have given it to him. Láeg resolved to go and yell at security later.

“Also,” Fergus continued, as though Láeg hadn’t spoken, “there are an alarming number of bottles in the recycling bin downstairs. And on the floor around it. And in the stairwell. Do you have a problem, Láeg? Is there something you need to tell me?”

“Our neighbours had a party,” said Cú Chulainn. “That’s why we went to Cormac’s.”

“That’s what they all say.”

Cormac disentangled himself from his friend’s grip, since Fergus was showing no inclination to move his arm, and said, “You didn’t have to come all the way here. I’m fine.”

“You’re not,” said Fergus frankly. “Although if it makes you feel better, I’m not just here for you. Láeg, any chance of a cup of tea?”

Láeg reached for the words to point out that it wasn’t really the done thing, just to break into someone’s flat, sit on their sofa, and demand a cup of tea. But they didn’t come. Truth be told, he _was_ glad to see Fergus, and to not be alone with the responsibility of fixing Cormac’s deeply fucked-up life – even if it came somewhat unexpectedly.

He put the kettle on.

“So if you’re not just here for Cormac…” prompted Cú Chulainn.

Fergus sighed and propped his feet on the coffee table. “I suspended my studies.”

Láeg dropped the mug he was holding. “You did _what_?”

“Don’t make me say it again.”

“Do you mean you suspended your studies, as in, you actually put your PhD on hold, or do you mean you ‘suspended your studies’ in the same way that Cormac suspended his? Because I swear to god if Conchobar’s been fucking with you when you’re halfway across the country, I’ll—”

“Relax,” said Fergus. “I _actually_ put my PhD on hold. No drama.”

“That doesn’t sound like ‘no drama’ to me,” said Cormac warily. “Why would you do that?”

“A bunch of reasons, and I don’t really want to talk about it, but the point is I have a temporary job, and it’s here.”

“Here? As in at the university?” said Láeg, picking up the pieces of the shattered mug. “But Conchobar—”

“Has no influence over the admin department of the museums and libraries division.”

Cú Chulainn laughed. “You’re going to be a librarian?”

“No, I’m not going to be a librarian. Can you imagine? I’d be a terrible librarian. It’s a PR job for the museums and libraries division as a whole.” Fergus frowned. “You guys are asking a lot of questions.”

“Fergus,” said Cormac, “you just drove halfway across the country without telling anyone, let yourself into Láeg and Cú’s flat with a key you shouldn’t have had, and now you’re telling us you’ve got a job here and are back for a while. But you hadn’t even mentioned to us that you were applying for one, or that you were even considering taking a break from your PhD, nor once suggested coming back to _visit_ , let alone live. I think we’re being pretty restrained on the questions, to be perfectly honest.”

“Literally yesterday you were saying you were too far away to drive over,” Láeg added. “You didn’t say, ‘I can’t be there right now, but I’m actually going to be back in town, like, imminently, so just hang in there.’ Which would have been a totally reasonable thing to have said.”

“Because they didn’t confirm the job until this morning.”

“It’s Sunday.”

“Okay, fine. Because I didn’t _accept_ the job until this morning.” Fergus took his feet off the table and stood, stretching his arms above his head until his shoulders popped. “I drive two hundred miles to get interrogated by you lot? That’s not quite the welcome I was expecting.”

Láeg finished making tea in some of their remaining unbroken mugs, and pushed them across the counter. The others hadn’t asked for a cup, but he’d made them one anyway. He’d made one for himself too, and the warmth of it was comforting. “Tea,” he said, “and you’re welcome to it. But you have to answer questions too. When did you decide you were suspending your studies?”

“I don’t know. It hasn’t been working out, ever since I transferred, and I’d been considering maybe taking a gap year to get my head on straight. Didn’t actually start looking at my options until about a week ago. Rushed a job application in because I saw it advertised about three hours before the deadline. You’re all acting like I kept you in the dark for weeks, but I didn’t. It was all pretty spontaneous, I guess.” Fergus took his mug of tea gratefully, and then read the mug itself: WORLD’S MOST MEDIOCRE GRAD STUDENT. “Did—” he began

“You bought me that, yeah,” Láeg said, before he could ask.

“That seems harsh of me.”

“You’re a terrible friend.” He took a sip of his own tea, then said, “It might have been fairly spontaneous, but it doesn’t sound like it all happened so fast you couldn’t at least have sent us a message saying you were thinking about being in town today. Or, you know, you could’ve rung the bell instead of weaselling yourself a set of keys. I know you always did like the dramatic entrance, but…”

“You’re right.” Fergus sighed, leaning against the counter. “I should’ve called. I was leaving myself wiggle room to back out of it all without having to explain to anyone. It seemed easier just not to say anything until it was certain.”

“And you applied for a job and got offered it within one week?” said Cú Chulainn. “Granted, I don’t have a lot of experience in the matter, but surely they normally have interviews and stuff, right?”

“I worked there during the vacations last year, so they know me.” Fergus looked at Cormac. “You’re being very quiet.”

“Tell me you didn’t accept that job offer because of me,” said Cormac levelly. “Tell me you haven’t abandoned your PhD and moved back because you think I need you.”

“Okay, firstly, I haven’t abandoned it—”

“Fergus—”

“What do you want me to say, Cormac? Of course the fact that you’re here is a factor. So’s the fact that Láeg is here, and the puppy, and the fact that if I’m gonna go anywhere I’d rather go somewhere that I know I’ve got people. But I suspended my PhD because it wasn’t working and I needed to clear my headspace, and I accepted this job because frankly I’ll be great at it and the pay is decent.”

“And what about my dad?”

“Conchobar can go fuck himself. I don’t understand, Cormac, I thought you’d be glad that I’m—”

“ _Fergus_ ,” interrupted Láeg. “Can I speak to you alone for a minute?”

Mutinously, Fergus put down his mug and prepared to follow Láeg out of the room. “Fine.”

“You can bring your tea, if you want. I’m not a complete monster.” He took his own cup with him to the bedroom, holding the door open for Fergus to follow and then letting it swing shut behind them both. Fergus had left his mug in the living room, as though it were a hostage situation, or a lucky charm to make sure he was back there before it went cold.

“So,” said Fergus, throwing himself down onto Láeg’s bed and crossing his arms behind his head. “You’re mad at me.”

“A little bit,” Láeg allowed, sitting on the edge of his desk. “Not because you’re here. But because you should’ve told us you were coming. Do you even have anywhere to live? That rucksack you’re carrying, is that all you’ve brought? Where’s the rest of your stuff?” Now that he’d thought about that, his suspicions grew. “What else aren’t you telling us?”

“I have more stuff,” said Fergus. “It’s in my car. I just brought the rucksack up because it’s got my overnight stuff and my valuables in it, and, well, in answer to your other question, no, I don’t have anywhere to live.”

“And the job? When does that start?”

“I’m not sure. I haven’t signed the paperwork yet.”

“Fergus…”

“Look, me being two hundred miles away wasn’t fixing jack shit. So I can’t study in the department here and should probably do my best to avoid crossing paths with Conchobar. Big deal! I was beginning to question whether the PhD was ever a good idea anyway. I may as well be in the area so that I can be there for my friends.”

“So you _did_ come back for Cormac.”

“Not just Cormac.” Fergus pushed himself upright and looked at Láeg. “Things are still going to be weird and disrupted and I won’t exactly be _here_ , I’ll be working, but… I’d rather be doing that within reach of you guys. Besides, someone’s gotta keep an eye on the puppy. I’m sure you’re a bad influence on him.”

“I’m a fucking great influence and don’t you forget it,” said Láeg, relieved that the tension had eased. “Fergus, when you say it wasn’t working out…”

Fergus shrugged. “There’s a reason it’s _really fucking hard_ to transfer universities partway through a PhD. I got lucky that I was even able to find a supervisor who would take me, but it turned out they don’t make it difficult just for the sake of it. It legitimately sucks, a lot. New system, new requirements, whole new way of doing things… and a supervisor who hasn’t been part of any of your early research. I mean, I’d have been better off scrapping everything and starting again, but I couldn’t bring myself to do that, so I kept trying to make it work.”

“So it wasn’t anything to do with Conchobar?”

“Only in the sense that he’s the reason I left. I haven’t heard a peep out of him since I went. You don’t have to worry about that.” He pulled a rueful face and said, “Low bar, but I guess that’s a good thing. Can I go back to my tea now?”

“I said you could bring it with you,” said Láeg, but relented and released Fergus to go and retrieve his abandoned mug.

“Where are you staying tonight?” Cú Chulainn asked when they returned to the living room, too astute not to have guessed that Fergus didn’t yet have anywhere to live.

“Oh, somewhere,” said Fergus vaguely.

“You can come back with me,” said Cormac, and was greeted with a chorus of, “No, he _can’t,_ ” from Láeg and Cú Chulainn.

“It’s bad enough that you’re living there,” added Láeg. “Fergus is not about to move in with you in your terrible flat.”

“On the other hand,” said Cú Chulainn, “if he sees it, maybe he’ll agree with us that it’s terrible and convince Cormac to leave.”

“Hey, remember that cockroach infestation—” began Fergus.

Láeg cut him off before he could go into any more depth. “Vividly.”

“It’s just one night. I’ll find somewhere tomorrow.”

“Maybe you and Cormac can find somewhere together,” said Cú Chulainn hopefully. “That’ll make it cheaper, right?”

“Get somewhere big enough for Conall when he comes back from Scotland,” suggested Láeg, though he hardly thought it was likely. He wasn’t sure Conall would ever stay still long enough to settle down, but maybe he could be convinced to stay put for a few months if his friends were holding the house down around him. “Split between three, rent in this town is almost manageable.”

Cormac said, “I’m guaranteeing nothing on that front, but seriously, Fergus, come back with me tonight. If you drive me over, Láeg doesn’t have to give me a lift. He’s done enough pitying me for one weekend.”

“It’s not _pity_ ,” said Láeg, but Fergus interrupted: “Wait, but didn’t you have a car? What happened to it?”

Cormac paused just a moment too long, and that was enough. Enough for Fergus to guess the answer, and enough for Láeg to realise how many more questions there were that he’d failed to ask, because apparently he was an utterly useless friend.

“Mother _fucker_ ,” said Fergus, joining the dots between Cormac’s missing car and his tortured hesitation. “Where is it?”

“Don’t, Fergus.”

“No, I’m serious, he can’t just _take_ your car. That’s _your car._ You bought that. I was _there_ when you bought it.”

“He didn’t exactly… take it.”

“But he took the keys and kicked you out and now you can’t go back for them?” Again, he read the answer on Cormac’s face. “We will pull a fucking heist if we have to, Cormac, but we’re getting your car back.”

“I thought you were trying to avoid drawing his attention.”

“A motherfucking _heist_ ,” Fergus said emphatically. “We are stealing those car keys from right under Conchobar’s nose and he won’t see a goddamn thing.”

He held Cormac’s gaze for a long moment, his expression fierce and protective, and then Cú Chulainn said, “Great! Can I come?”

Without a moment's pause for thought, three voices spoke in unison: “Absolutely not.”


	18. Chapter 18

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> láeg's pov was beginning to feel limited, so we're in cú chulainn's head now! little bit of jumping around, time-wise, in this chapter (lmk if it's confusing and i will attempt to clarify it)
> 
> the hot cross buns incident was inspired by #FinnFuryBuns (a drama which took place primarily on instagram between @finnlongman and @paperfury. buns were insulted. honour was challenged. there was baking. it was, at least, somewhat more seasonally appropriate than láeg's attempt). mostly because it amused me, and because hot cross buns are HARD, so. i relate.

_{Now}_

Cú Chulainn had never stolen a car before.

He’d never even driven one. He’d always had friends and parents to do that for him, and anyway, he was only just old enough for a provisional. Somehow sorting out driving lessons hadn’t been his freshers’ week priority.

Technically speaking, as Fergus had repeatedly pointed out, they weren’t stealing anything. They were reclaiming a car that belonged to Cormac, and if they got arrested, they had perfect justification for the whole situation. Cormac, at that point, had pointed out that breaking and entering to retrieve the keys was still a crime no matter whose car it was, to which Fergus responded that it was also, technically, kind of his house. Láeg had interrupted that he thought this was meant to be a heist, so nobody would be getting arrested anyway, and could they stop with the hypotheticals and do some actual planning?

Cú Chulainn wasn’t breaking and entering anywhere. But he also wasn’t his cousin, so the car wasn’t his, and this was most definitely illegal. He was trying to console himself with the knowledge that if they got caught, he had a chance at being tried as a minor and getting a lighter sentence.

That wouldn’t help Ferdia, though.

* * *

_{Before}_

Cousin Chat

[ _Puppy_ sent a picture.]

Puppy: _hot cross buns y/n?_

Nallnach: _no._

Cnaoise: _Yes._

Longest Con: _don’t do this to us cnish_

Nallnach: _aren’t hot cross buns meant to be. bun-shaped._

Cnaoise: _They have a cross, that seems like the basic requirement has been fulfilled. Did Láeg make them?_

Puppy: _yep. I think he’s trying to distract himself from the fact that Fergus is in our flat._

Nallnach: _fergus is in your flat???_

[ _Fergus_ sent a picture.]

Nallnach: _first you crash the group chat, now you’re in their FLAT  
_Nallnach: _damn fergus, where will it stop_

 _Longest Con_ changed _Fergus’s_ nickname to _Cousin Intruder_

Puppy: _Láeg’s been baking ALL. DAY.  
_Puppy: _well, all afternoon, with a brief pause in the middle while he waited for the dough to rise_

Nallnach: _far be it from me to criticise his baking but  
_Nallnach: _I’m not sure he waited long enough_

Longest Con: _this is what happens when you make hot cross buns in october  
_Longest Con: _we told him it wasn’t easter, and here we are, and they have not risen_

Cnaoise: _I’m not even going to dignify that pun with a facepalm.  
_Cnaoise: _It doesn’t even merit my exasperation, Cormac, that’s how bad it was._

Cousin Intruder: _they do taste like hot cross buns tho_

Nallnach: _why are you there?_

Cousin Intruder: _planning a heist_

Cnaoise: _… What._

Cousin Intruder: _grand theft auto_

Cnaoise: _Fergus, no._

Puppy: _it’s okay, I think you’d probably actually approve  
_Puppy: _that is if they don’t get arrested_

Nallnach: _whose car are you stealing_

Longest Con: _well technically speaking it’s mine, but  
_Longest Con: _we have been… separated_

Nallnach: _CONCHOBAR HAS YOUR CAR???_

Cnaoise: _Okay, yes, I do approve.  
_Cnaoise: _Although please don’t get arrested. I can’t post bail from here._

Cousin Intruder: _you have no faith in our heist skills_

Nallnach: _puppy you said ‘they’_

Puppy: _yeah they’re not letting me go >:( _

Cnaoise: _GOOD.  
_Cnaoise: _You’re seventeen._

Puppy: _I COULD HELP_

Nallnach: _no you couldn’t  
_Nallnach: _like… I hate to agree with cnish on anything but he’s right. you’re the only one of us with an unblemished criminal record, and we should probably try and keep it that way_

Longest Con: _untrue  
_Longest Con: _láeg is also a boring square who has never been even a little bit arrested_

Cousin Intruder: _firstly cormac, you got arrested at a protest because you sprayed whipped cream on all the police bodycams and then told them that if they were so desperate to be part of the surveillance state, they could go lick each other, which I’m not sure makes you particularly radical_

Longest Con: _excuse you I am extremely radical, and also, it was hilarious, and also, I had a point_

Cousin Intruder: _secondly, láeg’s record is not entirely clean, unless you have forgotten those scones_

Cnaoise: _Oh no._

Nallnach: _THE SCONES_

Cousin Intruder: _they were a crime … against HUMANITY_

Longest Con: _that’s a little harsh_

Puppy: _he’s just saying that because Láeg is currently cooking him dinner and he feels bad for dissing him when he’s getting free food_

Nallnach: _they were. so bad. I didn’t even think it was possible to fuck up scones that badly_

Cnaoise: _Yeah… they really were._

Nallnach: _point is, puppy, you’re too young and pretty to go to jail, so leave the car-stealing to the others_

Puppy: _if they had me with them, they’d be less likely to get arrested_

Cousin Intruder: _you can’t arabesque your way through conchobar’s window_

Puppy: _I have other skills_

Cousin Intruder: _you’re not coming and that’s final_

Cnaoise: _I confess to being relieved.  
_Cnaoise: _But also, you should all try and not get arrested._

Longest Con: _it’s like you don’t trust your friends to steal a car without fucking it up_

Cnaoise: _Give me one piece of evidence that I’m wrong to be concerned._

Nallnach: …  
Cousin Intruder: …  
Longest Con: …

Puppy: _wow naoise you’ve found the secret to making them shut up!_

Cnaoise: _*facepalm*_

* * *

They were up until 2am planning.

They wouldn’t let Cú Chulainn join in even with that. Nobody actually said, “It’s eleven pm, go to bed, you Literal Child,” which was probably a good thing, because he wasn’t sure their noses would have survived intact if they had. But they made him leave the room, and since he was deliberately avoiding doing any work, there wasn’t much else he could do but flop down on his bed and stare at the ceiling.

Especially because he’d left his laptop in the kitchen.

“It’s better you don’t know what we’re planning,” Láeg had said reasonably. “If this all goes catastrophically wrong and we get arrested, at least this way you can’t be said to be an accomplice.”

“I still don’t think they can really arrest you for reclaiming Cormac’s car,” he’d argued, but it hadn’t worked. So now here he was, excluded and bored and unable to fall asleep.

At about midnight, Cormac knocked on his door. “Still awake, Puppy?”

“If I say no will you go away?” he asked. “Or have you decided you need my help after all?”

Cormac opened the door enough to poke his head through the gap. He looked faintly embarrassed. “It looks like we’re gonna be up late, so I’m not heading home tonight,” he said. “Fergus is gonna sleep on Láeg’s floor, but there’s not really enough room for two, and the sofa’s too small, so…”

Cú Chulainn rolled over to look at his cousin. “You want to sleep on my floor?”

“Please?”

He sighed. “Will you tell me what you’re planning?”

“No.”

“I have a plan, and I bet mine’s better.”

“We’re not dragging you into this, Cú.”

“It’s not dragging if I come willingly.” He _did_ have a plan. One that wouldn’t end in anybody being arrested. He wasn’t entirely sure it would succeed, but it would at least not end catastrophically, which probably put it several notches above whatever they were concocting in the next room.

“You can’t come,” said Cormac, “because we’re going at lunchtime tomorrow, and you have a _date_.”

Cú Chulainn was silent. He’d managed, momentarily, to forget about that. How had he forgotten about that? He remembered the way Ferdia had blushed, admitted that he was leaving (for which he absolutely couldn’t blame him), and then, hastily, blurted out the invitation, bookended with a couple more apologies.

“Plus,” added Cormac, as though realising he was onto a winner now, “your boyfriend still has my clothes, so if you stand him up I’ll never get them back.”

With a deep sigh, Cú Chulainn rolled over to face the wall again. “Fine, you can sleep on my floor. But I’m telling you I have a better plan.”

“Well, if ours fails, we’ll come to you.” Cormac pulled back from the door and began to close it. “I’m borrowing Láeg’s spare sleeping bag. I’ll try and be as quiet as I can when I come in.”

“Yeah, whatever.” He heard the door click closed and his cousin’s footsteps retreat down the corridor; listened to the squeak of the kitchen door and the barely-audible murmur of voices as they resumed their plotting.

Then he reached for his phone, hesitated for a long moment, and dialled.

“Hello?” came a sleepy, uncertain voice on the other end.

His mouth was suddenly dry. This was a stupid idea. It was past midnight. What did he think he was doing? Did he actually _want_ any of this to work out?

Cú Chulainn swallowed a few times, his throat desert-parched, his tongue a heavy traitor unwilling to form words. Finally, just when he feared he’d be hung up on, he managed to ask, “Are you awake?”

There was a moment’s pause, and then:

“I am now,” said Ferdia.

* * *

[02:13] Ferdia: _hey emer is it gay if a boy asks you to go and steal a car with him before his friends can steal the same car_

[02:15] Emer: _yes  
_[02:15] Emer: _also what the FUCK_

[02:30] Emer: _ferdia??_

[02:44] Emer: _ferdia answer your phone_

[03:16] Emer: _ferdia where are you right now. please tell me you’re not stealing a car._

[03:50] Emer: _oh my GOD I am going to murder you_

[06:04] Ferdia: _RELAX_  
[06:05] Ferdia: _I was ASLEEP, emer  
_[06:05] Ferdia: _can’t a guy get four hours’ sleep without death threats_

[06:40] Emer: _NOT AFTER SENDING A MESSAGE LIKE THAT, NO, HE CAN’T  
_[06:41] Emer: _YOU BASTARD. I THOUGHT YOU’D BEEN ARRESTED._

[06:43] Ferdia: _only an idiot would steal a car at 2am_

[06:44] Emer: _why. are. you. talking. about. stealing. cars._

[07:10] Emer: _that silence better be because you fell asleep again_

[07:23] Emer: _jfc, ferdia  
_[07:23] Emer: _you are going to kill me one of these days_

[07:31] Emer: _i told you to ask him on a lunch date, not to go and commit crimes together_

[07:47] Emer: _if the police ask I’m telling them I don’t know you_

* * *

_{Now}_

They stood on the pavement in front of Conchobar’s house. “You can still back out,” said Cú Chulainn.

“I’m in,” said Ferdia. “Just remind me of the plan again?”

“We walk straight up to the house, ring the doorbell, and make polite small talk on the doorstep until Conchobar feels obliged to invite us in for tea. I’m basically the only member of my generation not currently feuding with him, and my dads have been nagging me to call on him ever since I started uni, so it won’t look suspicious, and I can spin it that I’m coming over to apologise for not making dinner this week.”

“And he’ll definitely invite us in?”

“Should do. He’ll consider it a point of personal shame that he didn’t lay in any cake.” Cú Chulainn squinted up at the house. There was no sign of any movement inside, but there were lights on upstairs, despite the fact that it was a sunny morning, so somebody was in. “Then after a suitable interval, I excuse myself to go to the toilet while you distract Conchobar, I nab the keys, and we leave without him noticing a thing.” He paused. “Then we drive Cormac’s car home.”

“Right,” said Ferdia. “I have two questions.”

“Shoot.”

“First question, why am I the one distracting your uncle?”

“Because you don’t know your way around the house so you wouldn’t be able to find the keys. But if you’re not comfortable we can figure it out.”

Ferdia shrugged. “It’s fine by me, I guess. But two… how are we meant to drive Cormac’s car? Neither of us has a license.”

That was, Cú Chulainn had to admit, the weakest part of the plan. Even if they managed to get the car out of the driveway without Conchobar seeing – which first meant figuring out which car it actually was – they’d still need to drive it all the way across town, without crashing into anything or getting stopped by anyone who might choose to enquire after their licenses.

“You said you’d had driving lessons,” he said.

“Four of them,” Ferdia replied. “Four driving lessons is not enough to qualify me to drive a stolen car across campus.”

He was, Cú Chulainn felt, taking all of this surprisingly well.

They both regarded the car for a moment. “We could just steal the keys,” said Cú Chulainn after a moment, “and then Cormac could come and collect his own car.”

“I thought the whole point was that he couldn’t come back here.”

“He can’t come _inside._ He could come at 3am and drive off, though.”

Ferdia pondered this for a few seconds more, then said, “Emer can drive.”

“She can?”

“She failed her test but she’s at least taken it, which means she’s a better driver than either of us and it’s like… marginally less illegal.”

It was beginning to look suspicious, the two of them lurking on the street. Cú Chulainn was surprised his uncle hadn’t noticed them already and come out to see what was going on, but maybe he was out. In which case the whole plan was looking infinitely more flawed by the moment.

He looked from the car to Ferdia and back again, then made a rapid decision. “All right,” he said. “Call Emer and ask her to meet us here in one hour.”

Ferdia shook his head. “You do it. This was your idea.”

“You know her better,” Cú Chulainn argued.

Ferdia pulled a face. “She’s mad at me. If I ask her, she definitely won’t say yes.”

“And you think she’ll agree if I do?”

“You can be very persuasive.” He gestured to the house, the cars, the whole street. “I’m here, aren’t I?”

He had taken surprisingly little persuading, but Cú Chulainn took the point. He retrieved his phone from the pocket of his jeans and scrolled through his contacts until he found Emer’s name, then hesitated with his finger millimetres from the screen. “You’re sure she can drive?”

“Ninety-five percent sure.”

Cú Chulainn called her.

She picked up almost immediately. “Let me guess,” she said. “You’ve been arrested, you’re too embarrassed to call your flatmate, and you’re hoping I’ll bail you out without informing Scáthach that her two favourite freshers almost went to jail before she could cast them in the show.”

He held the phone away from his ear and said to Ferdia, “Wait, you told her? Is _that_ why she’s mad at you?” Ferdia just shrugged helplessly and didn’t answer.

Well, at least that meant Emer wouldn’t be surprised by the question. Into the phone, Cú Chulainn said, “Hi, Emer. Good news, we haven’t been arrested. Yet.”

“I wish I was relieved to hear that. What do you want? And if Ferdia is there, please tell him he’s a dick. I have had three hours of sleep. _Three._ ”

Cú Chulainn looked at Ferdia, who was surveying the house in front of them. The morning sunlight danced across his light hair, illuminating the concerned crease of his forehead between his eyebrows. He had a quizzical, slightly worried expression, which only emphasised the strong curve of his jaw; his blue eyes looked brighter than ever, set off by the faint shadows left by sleeplessness. When he realised Cú Chulainn was looking at him, he smiled and then raised an eyebrow, as if to say, _Well?_

Well, fuck.

He did not call Ferdia a dick. He just couldn’t, even on Emer’s behalf. Even _considering_ it felt like a blasphemous act of sacrilege, and the word died before it came close to being spoken aloud.

He hurriedly looked away and asked her, “How do you feel about car theft?”

She was silent, and then said, “Theoretical car theft?”

“More like… applied car theft. How do you feel about helping us to steal a car?”

There  was a long pause.

Finally, Emer asked, “Just so we’re on the same page, does the person you’re stealing it from deserve to have it stolen?”

“Very much so.”

Her sigh was a rush of white noise across the tinny phone speaker. “Fine,” she said. “But just so you know, I hate you both, and you will owe me _so fucking much_.”


	19. Chapter 19

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> chaos, chaos everywhere

_{Láeg}_

Cú Chulainn was gone.

It was nothing to worry about. Cormac was just being dramatic when he hammered on Láeg’s door at half past ten, jolting him out of his unintentional lie-in. There was a perfectly reasonable explanation for why he’d found Cú Chulainn’s bed empty when he woke up that morning, despite the fact that Cormac was literally sleeping on his floor and should have woken up when his cousin crept past him – especially since Cú Chulainn had always seemed incapable of moving quietly first thing in the morning.

There _was_ a perfectly reasonable explanation, right? There had to be. Because _surely_ this didn’t mean he was out doing something stupid.

“He’s not answering his phone,” said Cormac. By this point they were all up – Fergus bleary-eyed and searching through the kitchen cupboards for coffee that was already on the counter in front of him, Láeg half-dressed and trying hard to stay calm about all of this. Cormac rang his cousin again and again, as if to demonstrate his point. “I don’t get it. How can he have got past me? I don’t sleep that heavily.”

Láeg hunted for explanations that didn’t involve criminal activity. “He has a date,” he said reasonably, as though by saying it out loud he could convince himself. So far it wasn’t working. “Maybe he just… left a little early.”

“It’s a lunch date,” said Cormac.

“So?”

“It’s half past ten.”

“Well, he gets anxious.”

“Not _that_ anxious,” said Fergus, drumming his knuckles against the kitchen counter. By this point he’d managed to find the coffee, but seemed incapable of locating a mug, because he was holding it aimlessly and staring at the jar as though he’d never made a drink before.

Láeg took pity on him, and put the kettle on.

“Either his phone’s off or he’s blocking our calls,” declared Cormac finally. “They’re all going straight to voicemail. I swear I’m going to _kill_ him.”  

Fuck. _Fuck._ Láeg could see exactly what shape these dots were joining up to make, and he didn’t like it. He made coffee for the three of them, just so as to have something to do with his hands that wasn’t punching a wall, and then he took out his phone and scrolled through his contacts as though there was somebody he could call to fix this. He didn’t know enough about his flatmate’s social circle to know who to call, though. How many friends did Cú Chulainn even have? None whose numbers he had. Most of them were from the ballet club, and while there was definitely some overlap of membership between that and the LGBTQ society, it would be an abuse of his committee powers to go through their membership list and call every number until he hit the jackpot, even if he could be bothered. Which he couldn’t.

He tried to think of any names Cú Chulainn might have mentioned, but nothing was coming to mind. There was the girl, wasn’t there – Emer? Would she know anything? It made no difference; he didn’t know her, couldn’t call her. And if his flatmate had gone where he thought he’d gone – and he was _really_ hoping he was wrong about that – he doubted he’d have taken someone with him that he only knew from the dance studio. It seemed unlikely that pliés would inspire that level of trust.

Láeg gave up, shoving his phone back in his pocket and picking up his mug of coffee instead. He felt a little stronger with it in his hands, strong enough to look at Cormac and say, “You know where he’s gone, don’t you?” Cormac looked blank, so he clarified: “He’s stealing your car for you.”

There was a moment of silence, and then Fergus swore loudly. “He can’t even _drive_ ,” he said, coming dangerously close to tossing coffee across the room as he gesticulated. “How does he think he’s going to steal a car when he’s never had a driving lesson?”

“Maybe he’s got an accomplice?” suggested Cormac, taking a sip of his coffee. “One of his friends – oh. Oh shit.” Impossibly, he began to laugh, hastily putting the mug down on the counter before it ended up on the floor. “Oh my _god_. I can’t – I – that boy…”

Láeg stared at him. What the fuck was funny about his seventeen-year-old cousin sneaking out to go and steal a car? If Cú Chulainn got caught it would almost certainly result in the family feud getting about a thousand times worse than it already was – and that was leaving aside the very real possibility of him getting kicked out of uni and slapped with a criminal record before he turned eighteen. As far as he could see, there was literally no reason to be laughing about this.

“What?” he demanded. “What’s so hilarious?”

It took several moments before Cormac could compose himself enough to answer. “Ferdia,” he spluttered through his laughter. “He’s asked Ferdia to help him. He’s – he’s taken his – his date to help him _steal a car_. Oh my god.”

“He wouldn’t,” said Láeg automatically, and then rapidly reassessed that in the light of everything he knew about his flatmate. “Oh, shit. Oh no.” He barely managed to stagger across the room and sink onto the sofa, staring into his half-empty mug of coffee as though somehow, _somewhere_ in there was the answer to all this. Fucking hell. He did _not_ sign up for this. _By the way, Láeg, your flatmate’s a fresher and also you need to keep him out of jail, thanks. Good luck with that once he takes it into his head to steal a car._ Shouldn’t they at least have asked him to _sign_ something before he found himself in this position?

“You can’t really think he’d do that,” began Fergus half-heartedly.

“That boy,” said Láeg, “is a tiny creature of pure chaos. _I_ know this. Cormac knows this. He is _absolutely_ out there committing a crime on a second date, because of course he is.” He looked helplessly up at Cormac: “Why is your family like this?”

“Too much academia, too little therapy,” Cormac replied promptly. “Leads to maladaptive coping mechanisms. Though I don’t know what _his_ excuse is. Possibly it’s the ballet. Those tights really do a number on your cognitive reasoning.”

“This is serious,” snapped Fergus. “Can Ferdia drive?”

“I have no idea,” said Láeg. “But somehow I feel like that wouldn’t stop either of them.” He should call Súaltaim. This kind of thing was exactly why he has Cú Chulainn’s dads’ numbers. This was an emergency, right? Intent to commit a crime was somewhere up there on the emergency spectrum, surely.

But something stayed his hand – the way Cormac had looked when he admitted the location of his car in the first place, possibly. If he called Súaltaim, this whole heist would be over. And yes, it was a stupid idea, and it was going to get all of them in a shitload of trouble, but it was also their best chance of getting Cormac’s car back without having to take his dad to court, and none of them wanted to go through that.

Láeg drained the rest of his coffee and put the mug down with a decisive _thunk_. “There’s only one thing we can do,” he said. “We have to help him.”

* * *

_{Cú Chulainn}_

So far, the plan was working. Well, if you could call it a plan. And if you could call this ‘working’. The small talk was growing increasingly strained as Conchobar avoided anything that might draw attention to the family rift, apparently unsure how much Cú Chulainn knew about what was going on and determined not to find out. For his part, Cú Chulainn was vaguely enjoying watching him struggle, but his satisfaction was marred by Ferdia’s growing awkwardness as he watched them sidestep around the elephant in the room. He’d started blushing about five minutes after arriving and had reached dangerous shades of pink before the tea had even been poured.

It had gone something like this:

Cú Chulainn: “My dads told me I should call in on you. I’m sorry it’s taken me this long. Is now a bad time? We can come back later if—”

Conchobar: “I was beginning to think I’d have to be the one calling in on you. I’ve had three worried voicemails in the past fortnight alone. Who’s your friend?”

Cú Chulainn: “This is Ferdia. He’s my—”

Panic. _Accomplice._ Not a good answer. _Partner in crime._ Nope, shouldn’t advertise that they’re about to commit theft. _Friend_. Inadequate. Was that even true? What’s the benchmark for friendship these days? Ferdia’d worn his cousin’s clothes and had volunteered to help him steal a car, is that how you become friends with someone? _Boyfriend._ Wayyyy too soon for labels like that. Oh gods. Was that ever going to be an appropriate label? Not at this rate. He’d been stalling too long, he needed to say something, Conchobar was looking at him like he was insane and—

“Dance partner,” said Ferdia.

Right. Dance partner. Because when in doubt tell the truth.

Conchobar raised his eyebrow and looked at Cú Chulainn, apparently awaiting an explanation, but he had none to give. “I, uhhh, went back to ballet?” he said. Fuck, but he needed to get better at cover stories. He was the world’s worst criminal.

Mentally, he crossed ‘creative writing’ off his list of possible degree courses to switch to. Not that it had ever been on the list, really, but it was worth knowing that he couldn’t lie for shit. Clearly his father’s dramatic talents had passed him by, too, so even if he hadn’t already been steering well clear of the theatre it was a sure sign never to go on stage in any circumstances where he had to _speak._

Conchobar, valiantly attempting to salvage the situation: “It’s nice to meet you, Ferdia.”

Ferdia, equally struggling: “And you, sir.” _Sir._ What a suck-up. It had worked, though, because they’d got inside and stumbled through the prerequisite introductory small talk and all the while none of them said Naoise’s name or in any way alluded to That Bad Shit That Went Down Last Year.

“So what are you studying, Ferdia?” asked Conchobar at last, once he’d exacted from Cú Chulainn a full report of his time at university so far, a report he felt sure would be going straight to his dads.

Quickly, and with an apologetic look at Ferdia, Cú Chulainn stood and excused himself to go to the toilet, slipping out of the living room as fast as he could. From the corridor, he could hear Ferdia’s hesitant-but-polite reply, the words blurred into a soft burr through the door. Even with the meaning indiscernible, there was something melodic about the way he spoke, the soft cadence of his speech as musical as the way he danced.

Ah, shit.

No time to get distracted. He padded down the hallway in the opposite direction to the bathroom to where a key rack hung beside the coat pegs. He hadn’t had the foresight to check what make Cormac’s car was, and the keys in front of him were an indistinguishable forest of metal and plastic inscribed with meaningless logos. This was hopeless. It’s not like he could take all of them and see which one opened the car – not if he wanted them to get away with this, anyway.

A flash of colour caught his eye, and he extricated the key in question to reveal an orange plastic keychain printed with black letters: _if arrested, call Fergus. if Fergus also arrested, break us out._ Beneath it was a phone number – presumably Fergus’s. On the keychain was a car key and a couple of house keys, as well as a battered library card. That had to be them, right? There was no way those belonged to Conchobar.

Cú Chulainn slipped the keys into his pocket and hurried back to the living room, where Ferdia was still stumbling under the weight of Conchobar’s questioning. There was relief bright in his eyes when he saw Cú Chulainn, and a question too, one he could only answer with a quirked eyebrow and a smile.

“We have to—” he began, unsure how the sentence would end even as he started it, but before he had to come up with an excuse his phone began to buzz in his pocket again. Funny, he thought he’d muted it after Cormac called him for the third time. Maybe he’d only muted Cormac.

He retrieved it: Emer. A signal. _A rescue, more like._ “Sorry, I have to answer this. Hello?”

“Where the hell are you?” The phone wasn’t on speaker, but it might as well have been. Cú Chulainn held it a few inches away from his ear, wincing at the volume. “We’ve been trying to get hold of you. Is Ferdia there?”

“Yes?”

“Both of you need to get over here _right now_. I don’t care what you’re doing. Or I’ll—”

“I get it,” he said, and hung up, looking apologetically at his uncle. “I’m really sorry. We have to go.”

“So I heard,” said Conchobar, somehow managing to sound concerned, disappointed, and deeply relieved all at the same time. “I’ll see you out. Will I see you later this week, Cú?”

The dinner. The one he’d told his dads he wasn’t coming to. Shit, that was going to look suspicious. “I—I’m not sure. We have this one rehearsal, and I’m not sure if I can move it, and…” He looked at Ferdia for help.

“Oh, yeah.” Ferdia grimaced sympathetically. “Scáthach was pretty firm that we all needed to be there for that. She might let you off if you ask her really nicely, though, but it could be tricky…”

He, at least, was a more convincing liar than Cú Chulainn. “I’ll see what I can do,” he said, a promise he wouldn’t have been planning to keep even if the rehearsal wasn’t entirely a work of fiction. Maybe he could arrange to be in the studio all evening just in case anyone checked. Maybe he could arrange to be in the studio _with Ferdia_ all evening.

The thought made his breath catch momentarily, muscles taut with anticipation. _Not now. Think about that later._ In his hand his phone buzzed again, snapping him out of his daze. This time it was a text: _COME ON!!!_ He admired Emer’s dedication to her role; it wasn’t like Conchobar could see the message.

“We really should go,” he said. “Thank you for the tea. I’ll – I might see you soon.”

Was it suspicious, how quickly he headed for the front door and fumbled it open? He wasn’t _running_ , but there was nothing dignified about the way he struggled with the latch without pausing to make further conversation. Hopefully Conchobar would chalk it up to the urgency of whatever mission he was being called to attend to. Ferdia tumbled down the front steps behind him, almost tripping over his feet in his hurry – gracefully, of course, he hardly seemed capable of being ungraceful.

With one nod in his uncle’s direction, Cú Chulainn crossed the drive into the street, walking barely a few metres before ducking out of sight behind a neighbour’s hedge, Ferdia crouching at his side.

 _ETA?_ he texted Emer.

 _Look up,_ she replied.

Cú Chulainn lifted his gaze, but saw nothing but a couple of trees and another stretch of cracked pavement on the other side of the road. He began typing: _I don’t—_ But he got no further before the browning leaves of one tree rustled, and a foot emerged, clad in rainbow converse. A second foot followed. Moments later, Emer dropped out of the tree, a few leaves in her hair, and grinned before jogging across the street to join them.

“Right, boys,” she said. “Where’s this car we’re stealing?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry it took me like three months to get this chapter up! it just be like that sometimes...
> 
> if you crave more ulster cycle shenanigans and memery, follow incorrect-ulster-cycle on tumblr or @seneolas on twitter, thank


	20. Chapter 20

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> so it turns out there's a REASON emer doesn't have her driving license yet

Cells & Serpents

Cormac: _hey, conall, how much is in your bank account  
_Cormac: _and also. how fast can you get back into the country._

Conall: _i don’t like where this line of questioning is going_

Naoise: _Please do not tell us you’ve been arrested._

Láeg: _nobody’s getting arrested  
_Láeg: _yet._

Conall: _look, it’s not like me to be worried, but also i’m worried._

Láeg: _if anyone gets arrested it’s going to be Cú Chulainn, he’s the one stealing a car_

Naoise: …  
Naoise: _You had ONE job.  
_Naoise: _Keep the puppy out of this._

Láeg: _HOW IS THIS MY FAULT  
_Láeg: _I’M NOT HIS JAILER  
_Láeg: _HE SNUCK OUT WHILE WE WERE SLEEPING BECAUSE HE’S A TINY DEVIL-CHILD AND YOUR ENTIRE FAMILY HAS NO INSTINCT FOR SELF-PRESERVATION_

Conall: _he can’t even drive_

Fergus: _he has help_

Naoise: _Fucking hell._

Cormac: _yeah, you can say THAT again_

Conall: _surely there’s someone in the country who can pay your bail if needed  
_Conall: i _mean you’re still actually talking to your parents aren’t you láeg_

Láeg: _not if I get arrested, I won’t be_

Fergus: _we are NOT getting arrested  
_Fergus: _but the puppy might be_

Naoise: _Why are you still talking to us? Shouldn’t you be trying to FIND_ _him?_

Cormac: _so here’s the thing_

Láeg: _we can’t_

Fergus: _we’re ten metres away from conchobar’s house and the car is gone_

Cormac: _and we’re pretty sure he’s in it_

Láeg: _and none of us can go and knock on the door and ask Conchobar if he knows where it’s gone, especially because we’re still kind of hoping he hasn’t noticed that it’s not there, you know???  
_Láeg: _so we just have to assume he’s not the one who moved it  
_Láeg: _which means Cú is_

Cormac: _he could be miles away by now_

Naoise: _WHO agreed to help him steal a car?_

Cormac: _we THINK it was ferdia_

Conall: _oh wow_  
Conall: _true love_

Láeg: _we don’t actually know for sure_

Naoise: _So you *think* he’s stolen the car, with help from somebody, but you don’t actually know that for sure. And if he has, you don’t know where he’s gone. And sooner or later Conchobar is going to notice that the car isn’t in the drive, and will probably assume it was one of you who took it, which means Cú Chulainn can’t even safely bring it to where you’re living, because he’ll get caught almost immediately._

Láeg: _…  
_Láeg: _shit, I hadn’t even thought about that part._

Naoise: _FFS.  
_Naoise: _Do you know where Ferdia lives? Would they go there?_

Cormac: _no, and no idea_  
Cormac: _we don’t even know for sure it’s ferdia he’s with._

Conall: _i’m torn between being appalled and impressed  
_Conall: _i stg, the balls on that kid_

Naoise: _He’s going to get himself KILLED._

Fergus: _so, anyway…  
_Fergus: _we’re kind of fucked. at the moment we’re just hiding out and waiting for him to contact us_

Láeg: _or for the police to do so._

Fergus: _right. or that._

Cormac: _so. yeah._

Conall: _fuck._

Láeg: _yeah._

Conall: _nish just threw his phone across the room, buried his face in his hands, and now appears to be trying to pull out that beautiful hair of his while wailing,_ ‘ _oh gods oh gods why is my family like this, what crime did i commit in a past life to be cursed in this way’  
_Conall: _or, you know, words to that effect  
_Conall: _now dee’s come in to see what’s going on  
_Conall: _she says ‘conall you’d better not be livetweeting this’  
_Conall: _as;dfkja;sdfjk  
_Conall: _sorry, she threw a cushion at me  
_Conall: _why are none of you saying anything_

Cormac: _what can we possibly say_

Fergus: _WE LOST THE PUPPY. HE’S COMMITTING CRIMES AND WE LOST HIM._

Láeg: _his dads…  
_Láeg: _…are going to kill me_

* * *

“I honestly don’t know _why_ that driving instructor failed me,” said Emer conversationally, swooping around a corner and smoothly overtaking an old woman in a blue Getz. “I mean, I’m a great driver.”

Ferdia, in the front seat, could see what Cú Chulainn couldn’t – the speedometer. Maybe that was why he swallowed, a little pale around the gills, and said, “It might’ve been because you’re going sixty in a forty limit.” Emer shot him a look, and he quailed, sinking back into his seat as though trying to get as far away from her as possible. “Or it might not. You know. You’re doing great. I swear you actually looked in the wing mirror a few minutes ago.” He gave her a weak thumbs-up.

Cú Chulainn leaned forward. “Turn left here,” he said, gesturing to the traffic lights ahead.

“This the way back to yours?” said Emer, shifting lanes without bothering to indicate. “Is that a good idea?”

Of course it wasn’t a good idea. It wouldn’t take long for Conchobar to realise he was the one who’d orchestrated the theft, even if his uncle probably also knew he couldn’t drive and therefore couldn’t have stolen it alone. And once he figured that out, the first place he’d think to look would be outside the halls where Cú Chulainn lived.

Fuck.

This seemed as pithy a summary of the situation as he could come up with, so he repeated it out loud: “Fuck. No. Okay. Emer, where do you live?”

“We are not parking a _stolen car_ outside my flat, Cú. I have a scholarship—”

Ferdia, in a strangled tone: “You’re literally driving that stolen car right now! At…” He checked the speedometer, audibly gulped, and said, “thirty-eight kilometres per hour above the speed limit, which is to say, pretty much double the speed limit, holy _shit_ Emer if you’re worried about losing your scholarship you should—”

They turned another corner, and Emer slammed on the brakes, the car skidding slightly as it stopped in a screech of tyres and what might – possibly – have been a small scream from at least one of its passengers. Not that any of them would admit to it. No one could prove it.

Ferdia was thrown forward and then jerked back by his seatbelt; Cú Chulainn’s head hit his seat in front and he reeled backwards with a sharp pain in his neck that suggested he was lucky he was so firmly wedged in between the front seats, because the damage might have been far worse. Emer swore extensively, with apologies in between. “Holy shit – I’m sorry – I – fuck – she came out of _nowhere_ – she –”

“I am never getting in a car with you again,” said Ferdia faintly. “You could have – you could have – you nearly –”

Rubbing his screaming neck muscles to soothe them, Cú Chulainn looked up.

They’d come to a stop approximately two feet from a grey-haired woman crossing the road, her pace sedate but not slow, a certain grace in her movements despite the heavy shopping bags she was carrying.

She looked up at the car that had nearly killed her, and three voices spoke as one:

“Oh, shit.”

There was no time to do anything – to disguise themselves, to hide in the footwells, to abandon the car and leg it. All they could do was sit frozen in their seats as she approached, rapping on the driver’s side window until Emer came to her senses long enough to roll it down.

“Hi, Scáthach,” she said, her voice only quivering a little. “I – er – fancy seeing you here.”

Because nothing says _successful criminal activity_ like almost murdering your dance teacher in a recently-stolen car that none of you can _actually_ legally drive.

“You mean, fancy nearly killing me here?” Her gaze raked over the three of them, eyes flinty. “What were you playing at? You’ll lose your license, driving like that.”

 _Don’t—_ thought Cú Chulainn, but it was too late; Emer’s expression had already turned guilty, her expression darting to him and Ferdia as though wondering whether she should confess.

Scáthach narrowed her eyes. “Next thing you’ll be telling me you don’t have a license.”

“We can explain,” began Emer, with the desperation that comes of knowing your place in even the corps de ballet is by no means assured for the next production. “It’s—”

“It’s not our car,” blurted Ferdia.

Cú Chulainn closed his eyes and thumped his forehead against the headrest of the passenger seat. Once, twice, three times. When he dared look up, he saw that Scáthach was looking at him, as though waiting for him to contribute further incriminating evidence to the admirably substantial pile his co-conspirators were managing to give her.

He said nothing. She appraised him, waiting for him to break, but he just held her stony gaze until finally a tiny smile quirked the corner of her lips and she seemed to make a decision.

“You can park?” she said to Emer.

“What?”

Slowly, she repeated: “You know how to park a car.”

“Oh. Yes. Yes, I can park a car.”

Scáthach pointed to a space in front of a long terrace of houses. “Park there. Then I think we ought to have a little talk, don’t you?”

Emer swallowed, and Cú Chulainn had the faintest suspicion that her ability to park had halved under the withering glare of their teacher. Fortunately for their bumper – and that of all cars in the vicinity – Scáthach didn’t deign to _watch_ the parking operation, but instead picked up her shopping bags and walked up to one of the houses, unlocking the front door one-handed with the ease of somebody who has done the same thing daily for many years. For a moment she was out of sight, the door ajar like an open parenthesis, but just as Emer finished manoeuvring Cormac’s car into what was admittedly a fairly small space, she reappeared, leaning against the porch as though she thought they might try and sneak off if she wasn’t watching.

Which, admittedly, Ferdia looked like he might do.

She crooked one thumb over her shoulder: _get in_ _here._ No room for argument, no pity, no hesitation. Like puppets on strings, they climbed out of the car and followed her inside.

Scáthach’s house both was and wasn’t what Cú Chulainn would’ve expected, if you’d asked him to imagine where she lived. Lining one side of the hallway were a dozen framed prints of dancers – _a_ dancer, he realised, Scáthach when she was younger, captured by photographers in a moment of perfect flight across a stage. On the facing wall were other photos, newer photos: three children in childish dance costumes, a girl of about twelve holding a bright shiny pair of pointe shoes, a boy in a cap and gown at some kind of university graduation, Scáthach with three teenagers outside a castle somewhere. Her family, he realised. She’d mentioned them before, mentioned that her daughter was just finishing up her vocational training and already had a contract to join the corps of some company he couldn’t now recall, but somehow it had never registered that they were … well, _real_.

She didn’t give them time to dwell on the portraits, though, already leading them down the hallway and into a surprisingly large kitchen for such a narrow house. A solid wooden table dominated much of it, and she pointed to the bench along one side: “Sit.”

They sat.

She made them all tea.

Then she said, “So. You’ve turned your hands to crime, have you?”

“This isn’t what it looks like,” said Ferdia desperately. “We only—”

“Stop,” Cú Chulainn interrupted him. Clueless. He was lucky it was Scáthach and not the police listening to them hasten to incriminate themselves. “Let me do the talking.”

“Oh, aye?” Scáthach leaned back in her chair, hands wrapped around her mug of tea. “This ought to be a fair story, then. You’ve a tongue on you.”

It was funny how all of his awkwardness smoothed away at times like this, how the terror of crisis triumphed over anxiety. He met her gaze coolly. He’d walked into her studio, three years and a transition after last putting on his ballet shoes, and he’d asked to be taken seriously as a dancer again. Compared to that, explaining away their forays into crime was child’s play.

“The car belongs to my cousin,” he began, “and was being unlawfully held by his father as leverage to prevent him from speaking out about certain events which took place last year…”


	21. Chapter 21

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> scáthach solves everything, at least partially out of spite

Láeg ended the call and sat staring at his phone screen for a moment. Then he swung himself off the sofa, snatching up his hoodie in the process, and used it to hit Cormac’s shoulder. “Come on. We’re going out.”

Cormac looked up. “Out? Why, who was that?”

“Scáthach.” He pulled on his hoodie, hunting around for the keys to the flat and shoving his wallet in his back pocket at the same time.

“Scáthach?” repeated Fergus from his slumped position on the sofa, sounding hardly awake. “Isn’t that the dance teacher?”

“Yep.” Láeg found his keys and used them to point at Cormac: “She has the puppy and she has your car. And she wants to speak to you.”

“Well, fuck.” Still a little bleary-eyed, Cormac pulled on his own jumper, and looked across at Fergus: “You coming? I feel like we could use the moral support.”

“Any support I offer is strictly immoral,” Fergus responded, but he heaved himself off the sofa anyway and followed them. Láeg suspected it was at least partly morbid curiosity.

Láeg drove them across town. “Here,” he said, handing his phone to Cormac. “She texted me the address. Do you know the way?”

“I can look it up,” said his friend, already pulling up Google Maps, which would have to do. Láeg relinquished all responsibility for navigation and focused on driving.

“Why Cú Chulainn told her to call me, I have no idea,” he muttered, scowling at the oversized car that was far too close to his rear bumper for his liking, and switched into a different lane. “I mean, why is it _my_ job to collect him?”

“Because you’re the mumfriend,” said Fergus from the back seat. Well, back seats, plural. He was sitting sideways across them, with no regard for his own safety or the cleanliness of Láeg’s upholstery.

Láeg glared at him in the rearview mirror. “Is that so?” He strongly suspected if somebody had called _his_ mother to tell her he’d stolen a car, she would not have calmly driven over to pick him up from wherever he’d ended up.

Though she _had_ been surprisingly sympathetic that time he wrapped his dad’s motorbike around a tree before he’d technically passed his test. It was possible that Láeg didn’t have a leg to stand on here, but since none of the others had known him long enough to know about that, he didn’t see any reason to enlighten them either.

“You were the mumfriend from the second you met him,” said Cormac. “Actually, you were already the mumfriend. Remember that time I had flu and you skipped your meeting to make me soup and yell at me every time I tried to get out of bed?”

“Well, then,” said Láeg. “In that case, he’s grounded. Where am I actually going here?”

“Left,” said Cormac confidently. “Wait. Fuck. No. Right. No—”

Láeg turned left and hoped for the best.

Several misdirections later, he saw the familiar sight of Cormac’s car, looking reasonably unharmed and parked competently enough outside a row of terraced houses. He had to go a fair way down the street before he found another space, and the three of them walked up to Scáthach’s house.

At the garden gate Láeg paused. “She knows it’s your car,” he said to Cormac. “I don’t know what else she knows. Depends how much Cú Chulainn told her. But she was pretty determined that she needed to speak to you.”

“Right.” Cormac took a deep breath, squared his shoulders, and nodded. “Braced and ready.”

“She’s a ballet teacher,” said Fergus, sounding amused. “How scary can she really be?”

Cormac shot him a look. “Spoken like somebody who has never sat in on their cousin’s ballet classes as recompense for teenage misdemeanours.”

“Obviously not,” said Fergus. “I didn’t commit any teenage misdemeanours.”

“Well, that I frankly don’t believe,” said Láeg, unlatching the gate.

“I just went straight to crimes,” Fergus continued, and, well, didn’t _that_ just figure.

“Ballet teachers can kill you,” said Cormac, “ _while_ standing on their toes, _and_ they’ll smile while they’re doing it. And then, just when you think they’re done, they’ll issue a cutting remark that utterly destroys your confidence and makes you want to shrivel into a – into a – something very small and shrivelled with no confidence. Shit.”

“And they’ll do that after they’ve killed you, will they?” said Fergus, which earned him an elbow in the stomach.

Láeg left them to their bickering and made his way up the garden path to knock on the front door.

The woman who opened it was small – _petite_ was the word, all collarbones and hidden strength – and graceful, dressed in charcoal and navy that accentuated the fierce silver of her hair. She didn’t look old enough to be so grey; Láeg would have guessed her to be about his mother’s age. Perhaps it was the strain of teaching ballet. Perhaps she’d had brown hair until whatever the hell happened today with Cú Chulainn.

“You must be Láeg,” she said. Scottish. Right, the puppy had mentioned that.

“For my sins,” he said. He jutted his thumb over his shoulder: “Cormac. It’s his car. And Fergus. He’s just… Why _are_ you here, Fergus?”

“Obviously to have the pleasure of meeting you,” he said to Scáthach, with the kind of smile Láeg had seen him employ a few too many times in bars. Scáthach didn’t seem impressed, but she looked more amused than pissed off, which seemed to bode well.

“They’re in the kitchen,” she said. “You may as well come through.”

The kitchen began to feel crowded as the three of them squeezed themselves inside, and Láeg was conscious that he was hunching his shoulders to try and appear smaller, as though if he didn’t seem so tall he’d manage to take up less space. Sitting on a bench behind the kitchen table, all in a row, sat Cú Chulainn, Ferdia, and a girl Láeg dimly recognised – Emer. The latter two looked guilty. Cú Chulainn did not. In fact, there was a slight _satisfaction_ to his expression, as though all of this had worked out as he’d planned.

Láeg strongly suspected he had _not_ planned this, but he hated to ask what had actually happened.

Emer threw something at Cormac, who fumbled the catch and almost dropped the ring of keys on the floor. “Believe those are yours,” she said.

“Please tell me,” said Cormac, “that you have a driving license.”

Scáthach chuckled. “She does not.”

Cormac turned his pleading expression on Ferdia, who shook his head. “Nor me.”

“So you – you drove my car?” he asked Emer, and in that slightly strangled question were all the nights he’d spent polishing that thing until it shone. Oh, he couldn’t do engines for shit, that was on Láeg; in a street-race he’d be eating dust. But that thing was pristine, and always had been.

Emer flicked her hair over her shoulder. “Yeah, you’re _welcome._ ”

Cormac made a choked noise. Cú Chulainn nudged an empty chair towards him with his foot. “Sit down before you faint.”

He didn’t have to say it twice; Cormac collapsed, a little boneless. Láeg thought this was an overreaction. They’d seen the car outside, and as far as he could tell, there wasn’t a scratch on it – and wasn’t _that_ a fucking miracle. None of the kids had broken bones and they hadn’t been arrested, which made the whole thing already better than several of the worst-case scenarios he’d envisaged.

But he took a seat too, just in case it was going to get worse, and Fergus leaned against the kitchen cabinets as unthreateningly as he could.

Scáthach said, “These three young ones of yours nearly killed me.”

Láeg put his face in his hands.

“I’m sorry,” began Cormac. “I didn’t—”

She cut him off. “I don’t need your apologies. Believe me, I’ve already raked them over the coals for it. I want to ask what you’ll do now.”

“What?” Cormac looked at her, and then at Cú Chulainn, as though there might be answers there. “What do you mean, what will I do now?”

“They’ve filled me in,” she said. “I knew your name but not your face, so it didn’t take long to get the sense of it. Now you’ve got your car back from that father of yours, but we all know you can’t park it at Láeg’s; Conchobar is bound to check there when he realises it’s gone, if he’s not already out searching for it. And I’ve been led to believe your own flat is not quite fit for human habitation. So you’ll be looking for somewhere new, won’t you?”

“I—” He shrugged. “Yes?”

“I thought so.” Scáthach folded her arms. “I have a flat,” she said. “Two bedrooms. I rent it out. It helps me pay the mortgage on this house. I bought it with a mind to my children living there, but none of them had it in them to stay, and if they ever decide to return I’m sure you’ll have moved on by then.”

Cormac stared at her, as though she were speaking a foreign language. “I don’t – I don’t understand.”

“My previous tenant moved out.” Scáthach raised her eyebrow. “I believe he’s living in the Hebrides now.”

There was a beat, and then the penny dropped. “Wait, _you’re_ Naoise’s mysterious landlady?” said Fergus. “He’d never tell us, but—”

Of _course._ Several things made sense now. Láeg _had_ been wondering how Naoise had managed to find a landlady who was not only willing to help him flee the country – and let him out of his tenancy agreement early without extra fees, which was almost more notable in the current renting market – but also one with the contacts to get him set up somewhere far from civilisation.

“I was,” Scáthach agreed. “So I know a little of what you’re up against, Cormac. I’d have stood by that boy if he decided to take your father to court, but he thought it wasn’t worth the fight, and I have to admit I’m inclined to agree.”

Cormac swallowed. Looked at Cú Chulainn. “Did you know?” he said.

Láeg saw his flatmate hesitating. He wanted to say yes, that much was obvious – wanted to pretend this had all been deliberate. But finally he decided on the truth. “No,” he said. “But I thought Scáthach deserved to know why we were stealing your car. Turned out not to take as long to explain as I thought.”

“You have _not_ heard the end of that,” said Fergus. “You’re lucky you weren’t killed.”

“I’m an excellent driver,” said Emer.

“You’re a terrible driver,” said Ferdia and Cú Chulainn in unison. Ferdia added, “I’m never getting in a car with you again. I think it took about a decade off my life.”

Emer looked momentarily outraged, and then Scáthach caught her eye and she seemed to remember that she’d almost killed their dance instructor, because she closed her mouth and sat back without arguing.

“Do you want the flat?” said Scáthach to Cormac. “Yes or no. It’s a simple enough question.”

“I can’t – I don’t – how much is the rent? My dad, he still has, I only have, I…”

“Two bedrooms, you said,” cut in Fergus, watching him struggle. “Both empty?”

Scáthach nodded. “The other boy moved out a few months ago. Naoise was my only tenant.” She appraised him: “You’ve just moved back. I suppose you’ll be looking for somewhere to stay as well.”

“I am that,” said Fergus, and then turned to Cormac: “I can cover us both. Not for long, but for long enough for you to get the rent together. We’ll work something out, with jobs, and your dad wouldn’t have to know. He doesn’t even know I’m back in the area.”

Cormac still looked conflicted. “Why?” he burst out finally. “Why are you offering me this?”

Scáthach seemed genuinely surprised by the question. “I need a tenant. You need a flat. It’s not charity, boy, it’s practicality. Besides which I’ve enough bones to pick with your father to start a natural history exhibit, and since it’s his fault my favourite tenant is living in my dead uncle’s cottage and trying to eke out a living across the sea from everyone he knows, it seems fitting enough it should be you that fills the void. And besides,” she added, “this wee cousin of yours is quite the talented dancer. I wouldn’t want to lose him to another ill-thought-through plan as he attempts to salvage the wreckage of your life for you. Better to save the heroics for the stage and keep both of those legs firmly attached.”

Láeg shot a glance at Cú Chulainn, who was leaning back against the kitchen wall, arms folded, legs crossed in front of him – almost a rebellious teenager’s pose, except far too graceful and poised for that. Beside him, Ferdia sat straight-backed, a slight blush colouring his cheekbones as though he was still convinced they were going to be dragged away in chains at any minute, while Emer appeared to be oscillating between guilt and reckless defiance. What a trio they made. He supposed he had to be glad the person they’d almost killed was the one person in this city inclined to take pity on them.

Cormac shrugged, helpless. “I guess?”

“The word you’re looking for is _thank you_ ,” said Scáthach, but her expression softened. “Go through to the living room, the two of you. I’ll sort this lot out and then I’ll take you over there and we’ll sort out the details.”

Obediently, Cormac and Fergus sloped out of the kitchen. Láeg stayed behind.

Scáthach fixed the three undergrads with a hard stare. “I never want to catch you breaking the law like this again, understand?”

“Understood,” said Ferdia.

“You won’t catch us,” said Emer.

Cú Chulainn just smiled.

Scáthach looked very tired. She squeezed the bridge of her nose, took a few deep breaths, and then turned to Láeg. “He begged me to call you rather than his parents, and said we’d leave it up to you whether to call them afterwards. So now I put it to you as to whether we ought to notify them.”

Láeg looked at Cú Chulainn, who looked worried for the first time since they’d arrived. In his eyes was a clear plea, and Láeg fought with his conscience. He _should_ tell them. Except if he told them, he’d have to explain what had happened next, and that might result in Cormac’s new address finding its way back to Conchobar somehow, and it wasn’t that he didn’t _trust_ Súaltaim, but it was also that he didn’t trust Súaltaim, and he certainly didn’t trust Lug, whom he’d never actually met, and anyway, his flatmate hadn’t even been the one driving…

“No,” said Láeg finally. “Not this time.”

Was that a hint of a smile on Scáthach’s face? It was impossible to tell; if it was there at all, it was gone almost immediately. “Very well, then. You’ll drive them home?” It wasn’t _really_ a question; more of an order disguised as one. But he nodded anyway, as though he had a choice. “Good.” To the three of them: “Finish your tea. The toilet’s upstairs, first on the left, if you need it.”

As Ferdia disappeared upstairs, Emer hunted for her other shoe, and Cú Chulainn wandered out into the hallway to look at the photographs, Láeg said, “I’m… sorry.”

“For what?” Scáthach responded, seemingly genuinely surprised. “As far as I can see, you’ve done nothing to be sorry for. Though there must have been some vicious crime in your past for them to have punished you with that hellion for a flatmate.”

He huffed a laugh. “Yeah, something like that. Look, Scáthach… thank you. For helping Cormac, I mean.”

“It’s practicality, not charity,” she reminded him. “Besides which, if it’ll piss off Conchobar… well, that opportunity’s hard to resist.”

“I feel that.” He felt in his pocket for his keys. “Right, you lot, you ready? Let’s get a move on.”

From the front room, Fergus’s voice: “Mumfriend, Láeg, you’re being the mumfriend.”

“Yeah, well,” he called back, “someone has to be the adult around here.”

In the car, he made sure the three of them had their seatbelts on – “Oh my _god,_ Láeg, are you _trying_ to embarrass me?” – and then eased out of his parking space before saying, “Right, where am I taking you?”

“Actually,” said Ferdia, and that blush on his cheekbones deepened from pale pink to crimson, “we were wondering – I mean…”

“Our lunch date,” said Cú Chulainn, resolutely not looking Láeg in the eye. “We never actually had it. So if you could just drop us off at the restaurant…”

In the passenger seat, Emer grinned.


	22. Chapter 22

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cú Chulainn and Ferdia finally get their lunch date.

Silence reigned over the small table in the corner of the restaurant, the chatter of other diners fading like the rush of waves across a distant beach. Within the bubble of their careful menu-studying, the sound was only broken by the creak of a chair or somebody’s foot scuffing against the floor.

The silence stretched, and warped, and took on life of its own, until finally it snapped.

“So,” said Cú Chulainn, over the top of his menu. The word seemed deafeningly loud after the quiet.

“So,” echoed Ferdia, putting his menu down.

Cú Chulainn placed his on the table too. “We just stole a car.”

Whatever Ferdia was expecting him to say, it wasn’t that. He spluttered a laugh. “Shh,” he said. “The waiter will hear you.”

“We already got caught.”

“Yeah, by Scáthach, that doesn’t count.”

Cú Chulainn leaned across the table and repeated in an urgent undertone: “ _We just stole a car._ ”

“You say that like I wasn’t there, Cú.” The name fell uncertainly from his lips – a hesitation, a request. “Are you going somewhere with this?”

“Yeah,” said Cú Chulainn. “Why the hell are we sitting here like strangers on a Tinder date? You’ve met my flatmate, one of my cousins, and heard half my family’s dirty laundry getting aired right in front of you. For some reason, that wasn’t enough to make you run away. Then we committed an _actual crime_ , and now we’re sitting here like we have nothing to say to each other.”

Ferdia opened his mouth to reply, but they were interrupted by the waiter arriving to take their order. Once he was gone, it took a moment for Ferdia to gather his thoughts again, until finally he confessed, “I don’t know what to talk about.”

“What do you _want_ to talk about?”

“I _want_ to ask how much of what Cormac told me about his family drama was true, and how much was an oversimplified, sanitised version of the story suitable for the ears of someone he’d just met, but I don’t know as that’s a great dinner table conversation, especially in a public place.”

Cú Chulainn pursed his lips. It was a fair point. The restaurant was cheap enough that there were unlikely to be many faculty members eating there, especially for a late lunch on a Monday, but there might be students who knew Conchobar, and he really didn’t want to have his parents calling him up berating him for trash-talking his uncle in public. “You’re probably right,” he admitted.

“This morning, Conchobar seemed…” Ferdia appeared to be hunting for the words to describe him.

“Polite?” offered Cú Chulainn. “Hospitable?”

“Guilty,” finished Ferdia eventually, to his not-inconsiderable surprise. It must have shown on his face, because he continued: “If he hadn’t done anything wrong, he wouldn’t have worked so hard to Not Talk About It. He didn’t ask about any of your family, or ask after his son – and he must have known you’d have run into Cormac by now. And the way he kept looking at me as though trying to work out what I knew and why the hell I was there… guilty conscience, for sure.”

Cú Chulainn sat back in his chair and regarded Ferdia. “Interesting,” he said. He’d known Ferdia was quick; he picked up choreography in moments, his sharp eyes honing in on the subtleties of Scáthach’s movements as though they were signposted. But he hadn’t expected that Ferdia could meet Conchobar _once_ and see his true nature so clearly – not when it had taken Cú Chulainn so long himself to believe that the stories were true. Was it because he’d met Cormac first? Because he’d seen Cormac at his worst and seen exactly how bad things were?

Ferdia flushed under the weight of his appraisal. “I wouldn’t have helped you steal the car if I didn’t think Cormac was the one wronged here. And Scáthach clearly thinks so too, and I trust her judgment, so…”

“You’d already agreed to it before that,” Cú Chulainn pointed out, and didn’t miss the way Ferdia blushed even more at that.

The waiter arrived then with their drinks. Once he’d retreated, Cú Chulainn used the condensation from his glass to draw circles on the table, trying to clear his mind. What was it about Ferdia that robbed him of words? He never felt so ungainly the rest of the time. For as long as he could remember, he’d had a quip ready to respond to any comments that were thrown at him. Now he was tongue-tied and awkward, words springing to his lips then bitten back and swallowed before they could be voiced, for fear that he was going to say something _wrong_.

In the end, Ferdia rescued him. “Why didn’t you go to ballet school?” he asked.

It was such a surprising question that his finger stilled in the cool liquid, and he looked up to see those blue eyes watching him carefully. “What do you mean?”

“The way you dance. You’re rusty, but you were good once. Like, pre-pro, vocational training kind of good. You could’ve gone all the way.”

Cú Chulainn laughed a little hollowly. “No, I couldn’t.”

Ferdia’s gaze sheared right through him. “Because you’re small?”

It could have been a loaded question, but it didn’t sound like one, not the way Ferdia asked it. _Small_. That’s all he saw. A boy who was too short to dance professionally. A boy who’d struggle to dance a pas de deux without looking like a child.

Was it possible he… didn’t _know_? Hadn’t guessed?

He hadn’t _intentionally_ gone stealth. Scáthach knew he was trans; it was hard to explain his disjointed dance career without that crucial part of information. Láeg knew, and of course his cousins knew, and he’d assumed everyone else must be able to see the moment they looked at him – his height, his still-smooth face. And even if they put that down to his youth – and he knew most of them did – surely once they’d heard him speak, his unbroken voice would alert them to it? Maybe being younger did help him pass; anything that would have seemed odd in an older man was just put down to his age, and nobody thought any more about it.

And of course, none of them saw the countdown on his computer ticking down the days to his 18th birthday, the date his parents had agreed to let him start T, and if they had, they wouldn’t have known the significance of it.

He realised abruptly that he’d been silent too long, and that Ferdia was still watching him. “I’m trans,” he blurted abruptly, figuring it would be better to get it over and done with rather than trying to concoct any excuses.

Ferdia’s brow creased with momentary surprise. “Oh,” he said. “I hadn’t – I mean, that actually explains a lot.”

“I…” He reached for his drink, his mouth suddenly dry, and took a sip while he desperately sought for words. “When I danced before, all my training, I… it was before I transitioned. I could have gone back, but I…” But what? But he was a coward? But he thought cutting his hair and swapping his uniform for a boy’s one would never make his fellow dancers see him any differently? But he was afraid that he’d permanently skewed his muscles in the wrong direction and he’d never be able to be _good_ as a man and what was the point of dancing if he wasn’t the best? “I didn’t,” he finished lamely. “Until now. I haven’t danced since I was fourteen.”

“Oh,” said Ferdia again. His voice was softer now, sympathetic. “Wow, I didn’t… I should have guessed, I suppose. I’m sorry?” He said this in a questioning tone, as though he wasn’t sure whether he needed to be apologising.

“Don’t apologise,” Cú Chulainn told him. “I’m flattered to know I pass well enough that you hadn’t worked it out.”

“Right, of course.” Their food arrived then, and they were momentarily spared conversational obligations while the waiter distributed the plates, offered them condiments, and finally retreated. After they’d taken a few mouthfuls, Ferdia said, “It’s brave of you to come back.”

 _Brave._ People loved to use that word. He’d done a lot of things that were brave, but apparently they all paled into insignificance compared to the miracle of Existing While Trans. But he could tell Ferdia meant well, so he just shrugged. “Emer blackmailed me into it.”

“ _Blackmailed_ you?” said Ferdia, looking intrigued. “How?”

“Well, she dared me, and – look, it was complicated. But she made me join the pas de deux class on the basis that there weren’t enough boys, and we both saw how well that worked out.”

He saw from Ferdia’s expression that he was just now piecing together why Cú Chulainn had initially seemed so reluctant to be partnered with him, resenting the immediate pigeonholing into parts usually danced by women. “I’m sure if you told Scáthach that it made you dysphoric, she’d swap the parts around,” he began, hesitantly and carefully, watching Cú Chulainn’s reaction closely as though unsure whether he was saying the right thing. “There are definitely girls in the class you could partner with. You’re small, but you’re not the smallest.”

_But then I wouldn’t be dancing with you._

Cú Chulainn suddenly found his food inordinately fascinating, looking down at his plate for longer than the act of cutting a mouthful really warranted. “I don’t mind… that much,” he managed. “I mean, it’s – it’s what I’m used to, so…”

“You should get the chance to dance the parts you want to dance, though.”

He took a bite of food, mumbling a response as he did. It was hard to concentrate with Ferdia’s eyes on him, shards of summer sky trapped amidst the delicate planes of his face, peeling back his bluster and poise.

“I didn’t catch that,” said Ferdia.

He swallowed. “I said I’m already dancing the part I want to dance.”

At first the expression on Ferdia’s face was confusion, and Cú Chulainn could see the questions on the tip of his tongue. Then the meaning of this registered, and a blush coloured his cheeks again, the corners of his lips twitching, apparently involuntarily, into a smile. “Oh,” he said for a third time, but this time he sounded delighted.

Cú Chulainn scowled at him, trying to ignore the lightness in his stomach that this reaction provoked. “There’s no need to look so pleased about it,” he said.

“Isn’t there?” Ferdia was still smiling as he tucked into his food again, and Cú Chulainn found he had an appetite after all.

Most of the rest of the meal passed in companionable silence, broken only by brief questions or remarks, but too soon the waiter had returned to remove their empty plates and he realised he needed to either find a way to prolong this date, or accept that it was ending.

“So,” he said, after they’d paid the bill. “I – I guess we should…”

Ferdia glanced at his watch. “Shit!” He pulled out his phone to double-check, realised his watch wasn’t lying, and immediately pulled on his jacket. “I have a lecture in ten minutes and it’s at least a fifteen minute walk. I’m going to have to run. I – I’ll see you at class tomorrow, right?”

Cú Chulainn nodded, trying to hide his disappointment as he picked up his own jacket. “I guess so.”

“I – this was fun,” said Ferdia. “Really, it was. 9/10, would steal a car with you again.”

“Only nine?”

“Well, we got caught, and before that I thought Emer was going to kill us all, so, that definitely put a damper on things. But the rest…” Ferdia grinned. “The rest made up for it.”

Cú Chulainn felt himself smiling in response. “I’m glad.”

“I have to go,” said Ferdia apologetically. “But I’ll see you tomorrow, I promise.” He was already halfway out of the restaurant, Cú Chulainn following more slowly. Outside, he swung his bag onto his shoulder and began walking rapidly in the direction of his lecture. As he reached the corner he glanced back once – and stopped.

Cú Chulainn lifted a hand to wave at him, but Ferdia was already jogging back over. Eyes a little wild, he cupped Cú Chulainn’s chin with his hand and kissed him, a brief soft kiss so fleeting it didn’t have time to deepen. Then he smiled, turned away, and set off at a run, leaving Cú Chulainn standing there staring after him, tracing the burning contours of his lips with his fingers.

He might have stood there all day if somebody across the road hadn’t wolf-whistled, breaking the spell that kept him frozen to the spot. Without looking round, he put his middle finger in their approximate direction, prompting a peal of laughter.

“That’s no way for a nice young man like you to behave,” said Fergus’s voice, and he turned to see Cormac’s car idling next to the kerb across the street, Fergus in the passenger seat. “What would your fathers say?”

“That you’re a public menace and probably deserved it,” he responded, and realised he was grinning without even meaning to.

“Need a lift home?”

Briefly, he contemplated the relative merits of the walk back to his apartment vs the inevitable teasing he’d receive in Cormac’s car. With the giddy lightness filling his body right then, he could have walked across the city or faced down monsters, and not felt even a little tired.

He crossed the street and got into the car.

* * *

Cells & Serpents

Fergus: _guess who just got KISSED  
_Fergus: _not me  
_Fergus: _obviously  
_Fergus: _it would obviously not be worth updating the group chat if it were me_

Conall: _the PUPPY?!_

Fergus: _ding ding ding ding got it in one_

Láeg: _wait, how do you know this?_

Fergus: _happened to be passing by JUST as his young gentleman friend ran up to him, kissed him, and then legged it rapidly in the opposite direction  
_Fergus: _I assume he had someplace to be and doesn’t just… make a habit of doing everything very fast, but you never know with these young people these days_

Naoise: _I’m so proud of him_

Láeg: _where is he now?  
_Láeg: _the puppy, that is, not Ferdia_

Fergus: _in the backseat of Cormac’s car grinning to himself and blushing every time he thinks about it, which appears to be about once every twenty seconds_

Conall: _omg  
_Conall: _i love him…_

Naoise: _@Conall, why is it that when the puppy gets kissed you go all soppy and romantic but you get up and leave the room every time Dee so much as LOOKS at me in a vaguely romantic way?_

Conall: …  
Conall: _because he is a BABY and it’s CUTE  
_Conall: _and you are a pair of depraved sex-fiends_

Fergus: _oh????_

Naoise: _That’s… that’s not even slightly true._

Conall: _i have seen… terrible things…_

Fergus: _well NOW I’m intrigued_

Láeg: _whereas I have absolutely no interest in knowing any more about that, thank you  
_Láeg: _you dropping the puppy off here, Fergus?_

Fergus: _yeah, should be back in about five minutes tbh_

Láeg: _excellent  
_Láeg: _I look forward to interrogating him about his date_

Conall: _deets deets deets deets DEETS_

Naoise: _He can tell us himself in Cousin Chat if he wants to._

Conall: _he’s not gonna want to_

Láeg: _don’t worry Conall, whatever I know, you’ll know_

Conall: 😎

Fergus: _I’ll tell you this much for free  
_Fergus: _it was almost SICKENINGLY cute_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you want to know more about what Dee, Naoise and Conall are up to – or you’re just wondering why it took me so long to get this chapter up – check out ‘Getting The Dee' (https://archiveofourown.org/works/20329633/chapters/48202048), a prequel to this fic! (Posted from the Shame Account, because it’s going to be smuttier than this one. Don’t worry, Conall is only very indirectly involved in the smut. That would be a terrible ship lmao.)


	23. Chapter 23

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Láeg calls by the studio to speak to Scáthach, and sees first-hand exactly how good a dancer his flatmate is… (aka All Of The Ballet Feels)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm still experiencing the Great Internet Drought of August 2019 (apparently it will be continuing into September, boo), but comments are nevertheless greatly appreciated! I will answer them whenever I can get to the library to mooch off their WiFi :)

Cormac had found Láeg at lunchtime and brandished a stack of paperwork at him, asking if he could drop it off at the studio for Scáthach so that he wouldn’t have to make such a big detour on the way to pick up all his stuff from his dingy basement flat. It was difficult to tell how he’d known to seek Láeg here, in a dark corner of the library he’d never frequented when his friends were still around to distract him from his work, but it was hard to argue with him when cornered by the full force of his persuasive charms.

Láeg had meant to take them over there in the early evening; he knew Scáthach was teaching for several hours after that, and thought if he could just nip in there before her classes started, he wouldn’t have to interrupt her. But one thing led to another, and a blue screen of death robbed him of an hour’s unsaved work, and somehow he didn’t end up leaving the library until several hours later than planned.

He’d just have to drop them off quickly, he decided. It was far easier to go to the studio en route from library to his flat; he really didn’t want to make a separate trip. It couldn’t be too disruptive for him to hand her an envelope mid-class, could it?

It was only when he’d parked outside the studio and was halfway up the stairs that he remembered which class he was interrupting.

Tuesday. Pas de deux. Cú Chulainn.

Shit. His flatmate was going to think he was stalking him.

Well, he’d come this far, he wasn’t about to turn back now – the sooner all the paperwork was dealt with, the sooner Cormac could move out of his mouldy death-trap and Fergus could stop sleeping on his floor, and both of those things were goals very much to be desired. He continued up the stairs, envelope firmly tucked under his arm, and was greeted by a wide choice of doors.

He’d been here before, a long time ago. The building was owned by a local performing arts school, he remembered vaguely, who cut university societies a nice deal when it came to renting out their space. There’d been a brief, disastrous period of first year where Láeg had decided the best way to meet other queer people was to get involved in musical theatre – which did, on some level, turn out to be true, but given that they were, well, musical theatre people, and Láeg wasn’t, they weren’t necessarily the queer people he wanted to meet. After that he discovered the LGBTQ society, and hung up his jazz shoes for good, but not before he’d spent three weeks in the chorus of a production of _Crazy For You_.

It had been a dark time for everyone.

Rehearsals for that had been in one of these studios, but that didn’t give him any clues as to where he might find Scáthach. He crossed the floor, heading for the reception desk to ask where he should go, when a flash of movement caught his eye through the glass panels of one of the doors.

It was the largest studio, its mirrored wall reflecting the dancers as they took a moment’s rest, some massaging sore muscles, others gulping water. Except for two.

Scáthach stood arms folded, eyes sharp as she watched Cú Chulainn and Ferdia in the middle of the room. They were both plastered with sweat, but they still managed to make their movements look smooth and effortless. As Láeg watched, entranced, Cú Chulainn leapt – an impossible flight across the room, landing lightly to spin and then let himself fall backwards. Ferdia was there to catch him, dragging him gently a few steps as his soft shoes swept along the floor, and then they were both leaping, both falling, Ferdia’s tall frame weaving expertly around Cú Chulainn’s smaller one, their turns not synchronised but harmonious as they advanced and retreated, advanced and retreated.

Láeg didn’t know a lot about ballet, but he knew about trust. He saw the assurance with which Cú Chulainn let his body drop towards the ground, expecting to be caught, and the skill with which Ferdia ensured he never fell. He saw the muscles straining in Ferdia’s shoulders and back, easily visible under his leotard, as he swept Cú Chulainn into the air, and felt his heart in his mouth as Cú Chulainn twisted and fell and fell and fell and – landed, poised, his right foot to his knee, leaning towards Ferdia like a flower to sunshine, before letting momentum take him into his partner’s arms.

Logically, he knew that Cú Chulainn was dancing what would normally be the woman’s part. But it didn’t look like that, the way he danced it. It was as violent as it was graceful, the sharp lines of his extended legs like spears poised to strike; the delicacy of his steps didn’t diminish his small frame but elevate it to something arcane and unknowable. He made the steps look as though they’d been choreographed for him and no one else – for all Láeg knew, they had been, and his proprietary confidence allowed him to embody them.

And yes, there was something grounded and masculine about Ferdia’s steps, the way he supported Cú Chulainn in flight, but there was delicacy there too. His trailing fingertips wove lacework in the humid studio air, a yearning grace in his long, lean muscles. A strand of his hair broke free of its rough ponytail and hung loose, softening the fierce angles of his face in a way that made him seem both younger and more untouchable.

Láeg couldn’t speak for their technical skill, or how accurately they replicated the exact pattern of steps they’d been taught. But he didn’t need to _understand_ it to know the feeling it gave him, deep in his gut, to watch them together. He felt – breathless. Caught. His understanding of humanity, shaken and made new by the knowledge that art like this, movement like this, was possible. 

And he saw the grins that crept across both of their faces as the music came to an end and the other dancers clapped – not in the dutiful way that students applaud their classmates, but genuine applause. Their expressions weren’t satisfaction or pride, but sheer delight.

Scáthach unfolded her arms. There was a beat, the room waiting for her verdict – and she smiled. At the sight of that smile, Cú Chulainn and Ferdia bumped fists, before separating to wander over to their bags and wipe their faces.

Scáthach spotted Láeg, then; he’d half forgotten how strange it would look for him to be lurking here by the door, entranced by the dancers. She crossed the room and pulled open the door. “Come to join us?” she said sharply.

He forced a laugh at the thought. “Not this time. Cormac – Cormac asked me to give you these.”

She took the envelope with a nod of thanks, then glanced over her shoulder to where Cú Chulainn and Ferdia were stretching, towels around their shoulders. “Hard not to watch them, isn’t it?”

Láeg flushed, embarrassed at having been caught. “I knew he was good, but I didn’t… I’ve never seen him dance.”

“They’re both good,” said Scáthach. “Though I’m not always sure Ferdia knows it. But when you see them dancing alone… well, they’re sound enough on a technical level, though it’s a crying shame that Cú Chulainn’s not been to class in so long, but there’s less of that… magnetism. It’s when you put them together that the magic happens. Or the crime,” she added as an afterthought, and Láeg spluttered out a surprised laugh. “I need to have them both in the studio more often; they’re too good to only do weekly classes. Perhaps it’ll keep them out of trouble.”

“Can’t hurt,” Láeg agreed. At least if they were in the studio he’d know they weren’t doing anything illegal.

Scáthach was about to go back into the studio, but then she turned back, eyeing Láeg with a raised eyebrow. “Sure you won’t join us? We’re a man down tonight. It’s a mixed ability class, and you look like you’d take to it easily enough.”

Láeg wasn’t a terrible dancer. He knew where his legs were and how to move them. He had a decent enough ear for rhythm, which had served him well in group numbers, even if he _had_ once managed to hit somebody with a stick during those three theatrical weeks. He maintained that they were the one who got the choreo wrong and forgot to turn, but this hadn’t endeared him either to the victim or the director, and he thought everyone must have been secretly relieved when he quit a week later.

Brief forays into tights-wearing notwithstanding, he was emphatically not a ballet dancer – nor did he think his flatmate would appreciate his sudden appearance in the class. It was more or less the only place he and Ferdia could be unobserved, at least by his cousins, who had an unerring knack for turning up wherever they were least expected.

“I think I’ll pass,” he said. Emer, running through a variation, spotted him lurking and gave him a wave, which he returned, but Cú Chulainn and Ferdia were paying no attention to anything except each other. “Thanks, Scáthach.”

Her expression was quizzical: “What are you thanking me for?” she said. “I’ve done nothing for you as yet. Now if you’re not coming in, I have a class to teach.”

“Aye, aye, captain,” he said, and tipped an imaginary hat to her. He’d have liked to stay a moment longer, watch some of the others to see if Cú Chulainn and Ferdia really were as exceptional as they seemed, but her tone made it sound like he wasn’t welcome. Reluctantly, he turned his back on the studio and headed for his car.

But he didn’t drive off immediately. Instead, he took out his phone. He didn’t really know what he was looking for, so he ran a bunch of searches for anything he could think of – _professional ballet dancer trans_ didn’t bring up many results, and _how late is too late to become a pro ballet dancer_ gave him such contradictory answers he wasn’t sure he could trust any of them.

Cú Chulainn hadn’t said he wanted to become a professional. If anything, he’d implied he’d turned his back on that path long ago. But was that because he didn’t want to, or because he didn’t think he _could_? If he knew it was on the table as an option, would that change his perspective? It was hard to believe that somebody _that_ good would walk away from dance if they thought they had a choice. And he’d seen the way Cú Chulainn smiled at the end of that variation – a wild, unrestrained smile, utterly unselfconscious, as though all the hesitation had been swept out of him with each movement.

It wasn’t Láeg’s place to tell him what he should or shouldn’t do. Still, some part of him felt like helping Cú Chulainn pick a different academic degree course was a waste. He could do academics later, when he hung up his dance shoes for good. But he could dance _now_. Sure, maybe it would be harder, because he was small and trans and had been out of the studio for three years, but it didn’t seem plausible that it could be impossible. Anyone who saw the sheer talent Láeg had just witnessed would have to recognise what they had on their hands, wouldn’t they?

Google wasn’t giving him any answers. He closed his browser and messaged Cormac: _I just saw Cú Chulainn dance for the first time._

Cormac: _yeah_

No, “What did you think?” Just: “yeah”. Like that said everything that needed to be said about his cousin’s talent.

Láeg: _he’s REALLY good  
_Láeg: _it’s impossible to believe he hasn’t been to class in three years_

There was a pause before Cormac replied, long enough that Láeg almost put his phone away. The message buzzed through just as his thumb crept towards the lock button.

Cormac: _he always was  
_Cormac: _good, I mean. he was the youngest ever to win some of those competitions he entered. one of them they tried to disqualify him for being too young, but they didn’t manage it, and he won the whole thing. pissed off a few people, if I remember rightly.  
_Cormac: _and Ferdia? since I assume you’re at their class_

Láeg: _also astonishingly good_

He hesitated, then, thumbs poised over the screen. It wasn’t his place, he told himself again. It was none of his business whether Cú Chulainn used his talent or not. He should leave well alone and let the kid make his own choices.

He just wanted his flatmate to know he _had_ choices.

Láeg: _do you think it’s too late? for him to be a dancer?  
_Láeg: _a professional, I mean  
_Láeg: _I know jack shit about ballet but I can tell he’s GOOD, and Scáthach thinks so too_

Another pause.

 _I don’t know,_ said Cormac eventually. _I don’t know if it would be… good for him, even if he’s good at *it*._

Láeg: _what do you mean?_

Cormac: _you know what ballet’s like, and I imagine dysphoria is bad enough without adding a fuckload of external scrutiny on top of your own personal relationship with your body_  
Cormac: _he could be great at it, but I don’t know if it’s the kind of career that would make him, or if it’s the kind that would break him_

Láeg: _maybe he’s stronger than you think_

Cormac: _it’s not about being strong, it’s about one day having to make a choice between your art and your health. in ballet that’s hardly a choice at all, and I know my cousin well enough to know he never backs down until something forces him to. he’d keep going until he destroyed himself  
_Cormac: _it runs in the family_

Láeg had witnessed too many of Cormac’s all-nighters to disagree with that. His friend’s capacity for energy drinks and caffeine shots was impressive and frankly alarming, and he was genuinely amazed that some of those finals-related deadlines hadn’t given Cormac a heart attack. He also strongly suspected he’d have kept working while they rushed him to the hospital. And Naoise – Naoise had abandoned everything and left the country rather than back down and take the easy way out, firm in the belief that what he was doing was his best option.

Cormac was probably right. Cú Chulainn could have his ballet shoes, his spotlight, his time on the stage – but it wouldn’t last, and it might destroy him.

Was it worth it, though, for that wild smile, that impossible leap, that weightlessness? For the life that seemed to thrum beneath his skin as he moved, an energy Láeg had never seen in him in any other context?

He glanced back at the studio, and asked himself one final question: _but is it ballet or is it Ferdia that he’s in love with?_

And to that, he didn’t have the answer.


End file.
